


we've only just begun

by suga



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Future Fic, M/M, Post-Canon, pairs skating
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-15
Updated: 2017-02-10
Packaged: 2018-09-08 17:39:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 21,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8854732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suga/pseuds/suga
Summary: Yuuri’s attention moved back to his phone as he typed a quick, “Quit telling everyone I’m dead!” in the comments of the last photo.Phichit, the king of social media at all hours of the day, was quick to respond with a cheeky, “sometimes I still hear his voice…”





	1. axel

**Author's Note:**

> ayyy this is outlined to about ten chapters! could be more, could be less, but 10 is the goal. 
> 
> things to keep in mind, the grand prix final mentioned in this chapter is in nagoya, japan of the 2017-18 year, as to keep up with the anime which is likely set in 2014-15. there were two years in barcelona back to back, so i am winging it from there.
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> ps i am absolute shit at titles so have something cliche af

Yuuri stood center ice with his arms out and head back. His eyes were closed as he tried to catch his breath, his lungs begging for oxygen, and he felt sweat drip down the back of his neck cooling instantly in the chilled arena. The crowd surrounding the ice was loud and echoing off the walls of the rink, and he couldn’t make sense of the announcer. What was he saying?

He tilted his head up to see flowers and plushies being thrown onto the ice as he bowed in each direction, completely on autopilot after the routine. He picked up a plushie in the shape of onigiri, which he now had quite the collection of, as he skated for the exit and towards Victor’s open arms. The smile broke across Yuuri’s face as soon as he stepped off the ice and wrapped his arms around Victor’s neck, clutching his onigiri with all of the strength he had left in his hands behind the other after the exhausting performance. He buried his face into Victor’s shoulder and inhaled, grounding himself once more.

Victor led Yuuri to sit and wait for his score in the kiss and cry area, their free hands tightly gripped between them, fingers laced. Yuuri held the onigiri to his chest as his score arrived, as Victor absentmindedly ran his thumb over the ring on Yuuri’s finger. He was quick to drop the plushie and scramble for Victor’s pocket to retrieve his glasses, to make sure that the score was real.

The cheering resumed tenfold as Victor tackled him to the bench, and Yuuri had trouble wrapping his head around the whole thing.

Again.

He had beaten his personal best four years in a row, taking home his third gold medal from the Grand Prix Final.

“I am so proud of you, Yuuri.” He heard Victor whisper into his ear before the older skater sat up, beaming down at him.

 

 

From then, Yuuri felt like he was in a daze as he stood for his medal, with Yurio to one side, glaring up at him with all of the “hate” he could muster between receiving his silver, and Phichit to the other, who looked ten different types of happy as he proudly held up his bronze.

By the time the photos had been taken, Yuuri was seeing stars and clutching onto Victor’s arm. He was ready to head back to the hotel and rest for the evening, but before he could leave the arena the press bombarded him.

Yuuri didn’t know why they couldn’t wait until the following night, after the gala. He just wanted to go back to the hotel and soak in a bubble bath with hot water to relax his overworked muscles. But he also knew the media and that they wanted to get the first words out of the Grand Prix Final’s gold medalist before anyone else.

“What are your plans for next year, Yuuri Katsuki?” one journalist called, while another, “Will Victor continue to coach you?”

Glimpses of the past year ran through Yuuri’s face as a fond smile tugged on his lips. Victor and Yuuri’s training that year had been different, though they hadn’t let anyone in on what their next plans were at all. If anyone else was in the arena at all, their training commenced as normal, with Yuuri practicing jumps he was still having troubles with and trickier footwork, but as soon as they were alone…

The questions ceased as Yuuri stepped forward, looking at all of the microphones and cameras in front of him. It was by no means a lot, but it was still enough to spark his anxiety, especially for what he was about to say.

Yuuri cleared his throat and paused, looking for his words as he tried his hardest to ignore his nerves.

“This season has been a successful one for me, and I must thank everyone for supporting me this year, especially Victor, who has been patient with me after all of these years. I honestly don’t know what I do without him. That being said, today’s performance was the end of an era, and I am retiring from competitive men’s singles as of the end of this competition.” Yuuri’s voice shook at the realization of what he was saying. Yuuri then bowed low. “Again, thank you for supporting me.”

Yuuri’s announcement was met with brief silence before the press started again.

“What does that mean for Victor?”

“Victor, what are your plans now that Yuuri is retiring?”

“Will you go back to Russia and train again? Will you compete again? Will you become Yuri Plisetsky’s coach?”

Victor, who had been standing quietly behind Yuuri stepped forward, fingers lacing with the other’s almost out of habit. He cleared his throat in a way that made all of the reporters quiet down immediately.

“No comment.”

Before the press could start up for a third time after being shut down by Victor, the two hurried to the doors to escape into the brisk air, grins on both of their faces as they stepped into a new chapter of their lives.

 

 

The following morning, the sun streaming through a crack in the drapes woke Yuuri up. He stretched his still sore limbs and nuzzled in closer to Victor in attempt to block the light shining over the other’s shoulder and into his face.

A few minutes passed before he gave up on the idea of going back to sleep and slowly turned around in Victor’s arms, not wanting to wake the older man just yet. He blindly reached for his phone on the nightstand and turned it on. They had both shut down their phones completely the previous night following Yuuri’s announcement; they wanted to celebrate instead, uninterrupted.

Just as he figured, Yuuri’s phone blew up with notifications as soon as it was on. News travels fast in the world of figure skating, and he wasn’t surprised to see texts from Minako-sensei more than anything else, between being tagged in Instagram posts by others.

_Retiring? What do you mean you’re retiring?!?!?!?!_

_You can’t retire! Yuuri, what are you doing retiring!???? You can’t do that! You’re not allowed!_

_Yuuri you answer me right now or so help me_

_Okay okay so you’re probably asleep and you deserve that but we are having a chat once you’re back down in Hasetsu Mister ‘I’m Retiring’_

Yuuri sighed quietly as he closed the texts to open to see what Phichit had tagged him in multiple times. When the photos finally loaded, he couldn’t help but snort, his free hand moving to his face to cover his laughter. He didn’t want to disturb Victor, after all. But it was too late, as he felt the arms tightening around him, and his back being pressed against Victor’s bare chest more.

“What’s so funny?” Victor mumbled, voice heavy with sleep as Yuuri’s eyes were still on the phone in front of him.

Phichit, along with anyone he could find the previous night, holding up a photo of Yuuri from the GPF pamphlet, with somber expressions. “ _I can’t believe we have lost an amazing figure skater today_.” “ _Never forget Yuuri Katsuki_.” “ _You will forever be missed, and be forever in our hearts.”_ The final caption fell under a photo of Phichit holding up a hand-heart with Minami Kenjirou, who had made it to his first Grand Prix that year.

“Everyone’s pretending I’m dead.” Yuuri mumbled once he felt Victor shift to rest his chin on his shoulder, trying to see the phone too. Victor laughed quietly before hiding his face in the space of Yuuri’s neck, his breath tickling him. He stayed quiet.

Yuuri’s attention moved back to his phone as he typed a quick, “Quit telling everyone I’m dead!” in the comments of the last photo.

Phichit, the king of social media at all hours of the day, was quick to respond with a cheeky, “sometimes I still hear his voice…”

Yuuri groaned, though he couldn’t stop the smile from forming on his face. He had made the right choice in retiring, but he was going to miss the friends he had made in the last few years. Especially the skater he’d been skating with in Detroit. He wasn’t sure how well the next project would go, so he didn’t want to keep up his hopes that he would see them again soon.

After the gala and banquet he still had to attend, that is.

After another quick glance through the notifications that had piled up through the night, Yuuri gave up and tossed his phone back to the nightstand before turning over. Victor moved to accommodate him before tightening his hold and rolling onto his back, pulling Yuuri on top of him.

Yuuri looked down at the sleepy man under him and smiled, and Victor leaned up to capture his lips in a chaste kiss, ignoring the morning breath on both ends.

“Have I told you how proud I am of you?” Victor asked through sleep-clouded eyes.

“You haven’t this morning.” Yuuri answered quietly, resting his forehead against Victor’s.

Victor hummed quietly, his hands moving over Yuuri’s sides, sending chills up his spine. “I am so very proud of you, my darling katsudon.”

“I am also, and I was worried about dropping out of the competitive season his early, but I think that will give us a head start on…” Yuuri started before Victor cut him off.

“You’re right. And everyone will be surprised.”

 

Victor and Yuuri were running late by the time they managed to get out of the hotel room, but both were relieved that the competition part of the Final was already over. The gala exhibition was a more laid back event on the final day full of artistic skating rather than technical, and Yuuri was feeling much more at ease.

And it was probably a good thing that they were both running late, as the majority of the spectators were already in the arena, and there were no people around to stop and ask him a million and a half questions about his retirement.

The couple navigated their way through the new familiar back hallways of the Nippon Gaishi Hall before finding the other skaters ready and waiting for their time on the ice. Their warm up session had not yet started, and Yuuri let out a breath, glad he wouldn’t be going on the ice without a short warm up.

 

The exhibition went smoothly, with all of the participating skaters finishing off entertaining performances. There were programs including skits and multiple skaters skating together, and Yuuri had a lot of fun watching his friends from the side of the rink with Victor.

 

 

The banquet that night was not as stuffy as previous years, though also not as wild as one year in particular. The stripper pole managed to stay inside Chris’ suitcase this year, but it was still an enjoyable evening, and by the end of it, both Yuuri and Victor sounded like broken records.

“Yes, I am retiring from men’s singles.” Yuuri said for what felt like the billionth time in an hour, and he was surprised that no one had caught onto it yet.

Victor continued to give no comment on the retirement as he sipped his champagne.

By the end of the night, Victor and Yuuri were tired of answering questions, and once they escaped from the banquet hall, they made their way back to the hotel for their last night in Nagoya. A brand new training menu was waiting for them in Hasetsu the following day, and they both needed their rest.


	2. flip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i suppose i made it pretty obvious but a lot of you guessed right! (i had been considering ice dancing instead, but victor and yuuri wouldn't be able to show off their quad jumps)
> 
> i'm not all that happy with this chapter since its kind of in between, but here it is. the pacing might be a little weird after this so i apologize in advance.

Yuuri had been expecting a party, so when he arrived home with Victor the afternoon after the exhibition, he wasn’t surprised to see balloons and streamers inside the house.   But upon walking through the door with their suitcases, the couple was met with silence. Yuuri’s friends and family were crowded in the dining area, and all of them were staring at them with wide eyes. Of course the news of his so-called retirement had reached them, Minako-sensei was probably the first to tell them, and he sighed quietly before stepping out of his shoes and into his slippers.

Thankfully his mother was the first to break the awkward silence as she bustled forward to pull him inside more.

“Welcome home. Have you eaten? Sit down, there’s lots of food.”

Yuuri’s looked around the room as all eyes were on him. Victor slowly followed behind them and took his spot beside Yuuri once the other had sat down.

“Are you really retiring, Yuuri?”

“What are you going to do now?”

“Are you going to keep skating?”

The questions rang from the triplets on the other side of the room, nosy as ever with their phones out, as if ready to reveal any plans. Yuuri bit his tongue as he was on the verge of telling them the plan. If it weren’t for those three…

“I’ll keep skating, of course. Victor and I don’t plan to stop skating cold turkey, that is just ridiculous.” Yuuri started, looking at Victor for assistance. He was quick to pick it up from there.

“Yuuri and I will still continue to train like normal, but perhaps we’ll both get on the professional track and just do exhibitions.” Victor said, glancing at Yuuri to make sure that was a safe answer.

Yuuri nodded and looked around the room, and it felt as though everyone’s tension left as soon as his mother brought out the food she had been preparing all day.

By the end of the night, the retirement announcement was a thing of the past, and he was glad to finally have a night to catch up with the friends and family he had been basically neglecting in order to practice.

 

 

The following morning, two phones sitting side by side on the same nightstand started ringing before the sun rose. Yuuri was the closest to the noisemakers and blindly reached to turn both of them off as a set of arms wrapped around him from behind. Yuuri leaned back against Victor’s chest and sighed, moving his hands over his face.

“It starts today.” Yuuri said quietly into his hands as he felt Victor nuzzle into the back of his neck.

Victor hummed quietly before pressing a kiss to the back of Yuuri’s neck, sending a chill down his spine at the light touch.

“Are you excited?” Victor asked quietly as he continued to place gentle kisses to the skin in front of him.

Yuuri stretched his legs and arms the best he could from where he was on the bed and nodded. “Yeah. It’s definitely going to be something different.”

“We’ve already been practicing, though.”

Yuuri rolled over in Victor’s arms and let his forehead rest against his.

“I know, but this time we won’t be also doing anything for my free skate or my short program. It’ll be all the time for us. We’ll have more time for more of the technical aspects.”

Victor hummed quietly, his fingers drawing soft circles on Yuuri’s back before moving them back to his waist to hold firm. The movement was quick and Yuuri wasn’t expecting it, as Victor rolled onto his back and held Yuuri up above him.

“V-Victor!” Yuuri quietly gasped as he stuck his arms out straight to keep steady, even though it seemed as though Victor had a pretty solid hold on his body. “Please tell me you aren’t going to start bench pressing me every morning.

Victor laughed quietly as he brought Yuuri down slightly, only to push him back up. “That wasn’t my plan, but maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea if I’m going to be lifting you over my head while on the ice.” he said as he lowered him again, only to lean up and capture Yuuri’s lips in a chaste kiss before pushing him back up.

“What if I lift _you_ over _my_ head?” Yuuri asked, almost with a challenge in his voice as he braced himself to be lowered again.

“I suppose nothing is stopping you from doing that. There haven’t been men’s pairs skating so there aren’t exactly rules to break. Would you be confident in lifting me over your head?”

Yuuri paused for a moment before slowly shaking his head. “Probably not right away, but it’s a goal to work towards. I could throw you into a jump.”

“I’ll do the lifts, and you do the throws.” Victor nodded as he spoke before a smirk grew on his face. “Until you can lift me over your head.”

“But I—”

“Don’t worry, I’m not saying you have to be able to do it this season.”

Yuuri let out a breath of relief and let his arms come down to climb out of Victor’s arms.

“You’ve proven that you can lift me up for a long period of time, but we should probably head to the rink before we are too late. I think Yuuko mentioned a birthday party booking out the rink early this afternoon, so we’ll until then.”

“Then we’ll go for a run!”

Yuuri whined as he rolled off of the bed. “Can’t we rest?”

Victor sat up stretched his arms over his head. “If you can land three quad flips simultaneously, maybe.”

“You’re on.” Yuuri said to the other before turning his back to peel out of his pajamas.

 

 

Yuuri stepped from one foot to the other as he fumbled with the ice rink’s keys to unlock the door. The night before he had been given a set of keys since they both decided to start training early in the morning, when the rink was more likely to be of use to them. While the Ice Castle wasn’t all that busy, they had definitely seen a rise in rentals over the last year. Birthday parties were the most popular.

“It’s cold this morning.” Yuuri mumbled as he shoved the keys back into his pocket and buried his face into his scarf, stepping into the lobby. Victor followed behind him with both of their skates in his hands.

“We’ll be warm again soon.”

Victor and Yuuri went through the motions of turning on the lights in the rink and locking the door so no strangers walked in. They spent a good twenty minutes stretching out before finally taking the ice.

Their training menu started as it always had, except this time Victor was more active. They got a feel for their edges as they did figure eights, and other basic warm ups.

“What do you want to start with, Yuuri?” Victor asked as he skated to the circle in the middle of the rink, where Yuuri was doing slow paced crossovers.

He stayed quiet for a moment before he finally came to a stop, curving in towards Victor in the center of the ice.

“We’re starting down a brand new path, so really, maybe we should start off at the basic of basics, even though we’ve already been practicing.” Yuuri started. “Maybe start with throws and side-by-side spins and footwork before we move onto lifts?” There was a pause. “Can we leave the throws for later though? We can practice jumps, but…”

Victor skated forward and reached for Yuuri’s hand. “Of course. We’ll do jumps before the party comes, and we’ll do the basics for now.”

So that is what they did. They switched between doing some basic footwork side by side, stealing steps from past routines they’d both done. The footwork was simple enough, but it was the timing they needed to master.

From the footwork, they moved onto spins. It took a few tries before they managed to not spin into each other. They were both grateful that they hadn’t done practicing camel spins, but basic upright spins instead. Had they done camel spins, one of them would have definitely lost a limb.

Yuuri felt like he had gone backwards about twenty years and was learning how to skate all over again, and while Victor hadn’t ever stopped training since becoming Yuuri’s coach, he felt that love for skating tugging at him anew.

Yuuri looked at his watch and his eyes widened at the time.

“We have about half an hour until we need to clear out.” He called to Victor, who had stopped to take a breather at the side of the rink, water bottle in hand.

“You owe me three quad flips still!” Yuuri’s jaw dropped and Victor laughed. “You can work up to them.”

Yuuri grumbled quietly under his breath and started to pick up his pace around the rink. He started off with a simple single flip, which he soon followed up with a double flip. He did another lap around the rink before throwing himself into a triple flip.

His legs were burning from the lack of use the day before, but it was a burn he enjoyed. He grinned as he leaped into a triple axel.

Yuuri’s mind was starting to clear as he continued to throw himself into jumps; a quad salchow followed the triple axel. He was working his way up to the flip as he just barely hung on with a quad loop. He was starting to get tired, and knew that if he didn’t land the next three jumps, Victor wouldn’t let him rest.

He took off into the first quad flip and made it by the skin of his teeth, his leg shaking under him as he landed, but he had done the full four rotations without touching down. Victor shouted out, “one!” before Yuuri took off into another.

“Two!”

Yuuri grinned to himself as he picked up speed around the end of the rink, the brisk air cutting across his warm skin. He turned and skated backwards, still picking up speed before digging his toe into the ice and jumping with his arms pressed close to his chest, and one leg crossed over the other. As his foot came back to the ice and hearing Victor yell, “three!” he let out a relieved breath.

“You’ve gotten so good at those, Yuuri!” Victor said as Yuuri made his way back to the side of the rink. “I think you’ve deserved your rest.”

Yuuri nodded and glanced at his watch again. “We’ve still got a little bit more time, let’s get a bit more in before we go back.”

 

 

Victor and Yuuri left the ice a short while later to find a bunch of children in the lobby and Yuuko behind the counter handing out tiny skates. Yuuri and Victor did their best to stay out of the way, but as soon as one child recognized them both, it was game over.

“It’s Yuuri Katsuki and Victor Nikiforov!” they screamed and Yuuri and Victor both shared _that look_. They both eyed Yuuko, who seemed to be hiding her face behind her hand, to not give away that she was, in fact, laughing.

The crowd of tiny children gathered in front of Yuuri and Victor, and the two were at a loss. Thankfully, the majority just wanted photos, and they opted for one group photo together before getting sent on their way, onto the ice after it had been cleared.

“You two were here early.” Yuuko said quietly once the last of the children were on the ice. “And I have a question.”

“What is it?” Yuuri asked as he cleaned off his skate blades with a rag.

Yuuko bit the inside of her lip, looking rather deep in thought.

“What are you two planning, exactly?” she finally asked, her cheeks turning a light shade of pink at the question. “Yuuri, you seemed rather specific in all those interviews about retiring from _men’s singles_ , and I know I’m not the only one that noticed. The girls have been frantically trying to piece something together from all the interviews from the other day…”

Yuuri had long dropped the rag on his lap and turned to Victor, feeling his face pale.

“Well, about that…” Yuuri started, not sure where to start at all, really.

“I got here a short while ago to prepare for the birthday party.” Yuuko continued, nodding in the direction of the ice rink. “Victor was training harder than normal.”

“I’m trying to stay in shape, of course.” Victor tried to say, grin on his face but even he thought he didn’t sound convincing.

Yuuko sighed, and ran her hand down her face. “Just, whatever you do, please be careful doing lifts, and please don’t let go of each other in a death spiral. I don’t need to visit either of you in the hospital any time soon.”

Yuuri’s eyes widened, as did Victor’s only slightly.

“Yu-Yuuko, please…” Yuuri tried, looking to Victor.

“Please, whatever you do, keep this between the three of us, okay?” Victor asked. “Especially those girls of yours. We don’t know how well this is going to work, and we really don’t want this to get out yet.”

Yuuri was nodding frantically beside Victor and Yuuko sighed.

“I wouldn’t have told them if my life depended on it. I don’t need you going viral _again._ ”

Yuuri coughed quietly and looked to his feet. “I mean, I don’t mind that I went viral then because Victor is here, but yeah, keeping this from them would be most appreciated.”

Victor gasped quietly beside Yuuri before leaning over and wrapping his arms around him. “You’re glad I’m heeeere!” he sang, rocking the other side to side. “You love me.”

“Yes, of course.” Yuuri mumbled as Yuuko turned her back to them.

“You’re both gross.”

“You love us too, Yuuko!” Victor called as she made her way back into the skate shop.

Yuuri let out a quiet sigh before turning to Victor and pressing a quiet kiss to the top of his head.

“I think it will be good that she knows. She can keep people away from the rink when we are practicing.”

“Ooh, like a bodyguard. A tiny, cute bodyguard.”

“Honestly, it’s just the triplets we need to worry about.”

“I must thank them for uploading that video all those years ago.” Victor said quietly, pulling back from leaning on Yuuri, lazy smile on his face. “Who knew I’d meet my husband?”

Yuuri snorted quietly and finished cleaning off his skates. “You’re such a sap.” After pulling on his shoes, he stood up with his skates in one hand and offered the other to Victor. “Let’s go home and get some well deserved rest.”


	3. triple twist

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> when i started planning this fic, i wasn't expecting the ending of episode 12 to be a thing that would actually happen, so here we are. and on that topic, that episode!!!!!!! right? anyway, here's this chapter which i wanted to be done like four days ago but writers block and all that.
> 
> also i hope everyone is having a good holiday so far!

Victor and Yuuri worked themselves hard into the New Year, and Yuuko had done a swell job at keeping their secret. They’d practiced day in and day out with little rest, because the project was so new and exciting, they didn’t want to stop.

As they came into their finishing position of their free skate program, Yuuko ran into the rink, waving her arms frantically to the side closest to where the couple stood.

“Guys, guys! Great news!” she cried, causing both Victor and Yuuri to skate towards her.

“What is it?” Yuuri asked, cocking his head to the side, curious as to what had got his friend so riled up. There was a big smile on her face as she looked towards Victor before brandishing a flier from behind her.

Victor and Yuuri looked at it for a moment before the older of the two leaned over. “What is this?” he whispered into Yuuri’s ear.

While Victor had been living in Hasetsu for the better part of the last few years, _reading_ Japanese was still not his strong suit. If he had to communicate in Japanese, he preferred to speak.

“A competition?” Yuuri asked, eyes moving back up to Yuuko’s wide grin.

“Oh! Right!” Victor then exclaimed, standing up straight,. “I was asking Yuuko about any small competitions that we could possibly test out our performances at, to see if we are ready for the international circuit.”

Yuuri nodded slowly, looking between the two. “We aren’t part of an official club, though. Would we be able to participate in an interclub competition like this?”

Yuuko bit the inside of her lip before nodding quickly; she looked about ready to explode. “I did the research, and they weren’t all that strict about what skating _club_ you were representing. You can represent Ice Castle, basically. They were only doing free skates for the pairs, I think, since there are so many people skating over a single weekend. If you want to participate, you have to register by the end of this week. The competition is at the beginning of April. It’s an end of season regional competition.”

Yuuri looked between Yuuko and Victor, and Victor’s smile was impossibly wide as he listened to the girl in front of them. He turned to Yuuri a moment later.

“What do you say? Should we give this a go?”

“People are going to find out.” Yuuri said, feeling his face heat up. “It won’t be a secret anymore.”

“It’s a big step, but I think we are ready.” Victor countered, turning to Yuuko. “Will you watch the free skate? I trust your judgment.”

At the comment, Yuuko’s face immediately went ten different shades of red and she jerked her head in a nodding sort of fashion before moving towards the speaker system to turn their music on once the two were in position center ice.

Victor let his hand come to rest on Yuuri’s cheek, as Yuuri’s hand sat upon Victor’s waist, their free arms out to the side. And the music started with a gentle piano as they both pulled away from one another, before turning away.

Their routine started with intricate side by side serpentine step sequences filled with twizzles and mohawk-turns before they broke away from one another again, breaking into their first side-by-side spin, both flying sit spins, as the song broke in with the drums. The sit spins became upright spins before they pushed off onto their other legs into side-by-side camel spins, both with their hands behind their back. As their spins came to an end, their hands came together as they picked up speed, and with one swift movement, Victor was lifting Yuuri over his head as they spun across the ice. He tossed Yuuri up into a triple-twist before bringing him back down to his feet.

As the music came back to the calm pianos once more, they continued their step sequence from the beginning, weaving their way from one end of the rink to the other, with quick lifts and fancy footwork, before Victor reached for Yuuri’s hand. Victor dug his skate pick into the ice to balance in a pivot with Yuuri leaning down into a hard edge for a death spiral. The move still made Yuuri nervous even after all the practice, but it was an unfortunate required element.

Then it was Yuuri’s turn to take charge once he was upright, and he pulled Victor into a spin, Yuuri in a sit spin, and Victor in a camel spin, switching feet half way through before pulling back up and away from each other. They met seconds later as they gained speed before Yuuri threw Victor into a quadruple salchow, which they could hear Yuuko cheering from the sidelines, before the step sequences came back, with Yuuri and Victor pushing into separate Ina Bauers, skating away from one another before circling back around to each other.

As they could feel the music start to ramp up for its final verse, the two came around the edge of the rink side by side, gaining speed as they turned backwards. They broke apart once they reached center ice, and within the last few chords, both jammed took off with their toe into Victor’s signature quad flip. Yuuri’s landing was a tad wobbly, but Victor landed it perfectly and they grinned at each other as Yuuko once again cheered from the sidelines. The music was still playing however, as the two came back together to return to their starting position, with Victor’s hand on Yuuri’s cheek, and Yuuri’s hand on Victor’s waist.

The two kept their eyes on one another for a moment before they turned to see Yuuko with her hands over her mouth, bouncing between her feet.

“How was it?” Yuuri asked as they skated towards her.

“You’ll win for sure. Quads are so rare in pairs, you’re gonna blow the judges away. But you guys were both so confident, wow. You’re going to do so well.”

Victor and Yuuri turned to each other and shared a look. They were ready.

 

By the end of that week, Victor and Yuuri had been registered, and the registration staff had to phone the Ice Castle to make sure that it hadn’t been a typo.

“ _The_ Victor Nikiforov? And Katsuki Yuuri?” they cried into the phone, and Yuuko pulled it away from her ear as she stood in the skate shop the very same afternoon. “You have to be joking, we don’t take—”

Yuuko cleared her throat, shutting the person up on the other end.

“I know it sounds mental, but it’s true. Victor Nikiforov and Katsuki Yuuri will be competing in pairs. They’ve been practicing since before the end of the Grand Prix Final, and they look forward to their trip to Fukuoka.”

The person on the other end spluttered before giving a weak, “Very well.”

 

During the month of March, Yuuri and Victor weren’t surprised to hear the rumours of their return slowly start to spread. Neither of them commented on it if they were asked, and left the subject completely open ended as their training continued to perfect their jumps, their throws, and their side by side spins.

By the time the first weekend in April rolled around, both their social medias were buzzing once they had been spotted around the area of the arena where the regional competition was being held.

 

“I’m getting nervous.” Yuuri admitted quietly as they walked into the arena and towards the registration area for check in. “I feel like everyone is staring at us.” He paused for a minute before he sighed. “At _you._ ”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Victor whispered back as they stopped in front of the registration table. “It’s not like I’m trying to draw attention to myself.”

“You’re wearing sunglasses. We’re inside. And it was raining out.”

“Wow, it is true.” A girl behind the table said, wide eyes darting between the two men. “I didn’t think…” she looked back to the table and began scrambling through the paperwork. “I thought someone was playing a trick on me.” She produced a piece of paper a few moments later and held it up, squinting. “Victor Nikiforov and Katsuki Yuuri, pairs?” she looked at them with a question in her voice until Yuuri nodded. “Pairs free skate. You’re in the third group, which is later this afternoon. Dressing room ten is available for those in your group to get ready two hours beforehand, just keep this sheet of paper.” The girl spoke quickly, as if trying to rush them away. There was a pink tinge in her cheeks as Yuuri took the paper from her. “I’m really looking forward to seeing you both skate. Good luck.” She added after, more under her breath than anything.

“Th-thanks.” Yuuri stuttered before stepping away, Victor following right behind him.

“For the record, I’m wearing sunglasses inside because the florescent lights give me a headache.”

“You’ve never complained before.” Yuuri mumbled as he weaved through the crowd.

Victor cleared his throat but decided against continuing the conversation. He reached for Yuuri’s hand with his free hand and led him into the arena. They still had a few hours until they had to get ready, so what better way to pass time than to watch the juniors skate.

 

“Look at him, he’s so small and cute!” Victor cried quietly, muffling his voice into Yuuri’s shoulder as the third group of novices took the ice. They were into the last group of under thirteens, and Yuuri slowly shook his head.

“You’ve literally said that about everyone so far.” Yuuri said quietly, resting his head against Victor’s.

“Oh, I know, but our competitions never have kids this small on the ice.” Victor said before gasping slowly as the nine year old on the ice took off into a perfect single loop. “It makes me think of when I first started.”

Yuuri raised his eyebrow slightly at the comment though didn’t move his head. “Oh? It’s hard to imagine you this small.”

“I should find the tapes, they’re around my parents attic somewhere I’m sure.”

Yuuri grinned at that. “I’d love that.”

 

A few hours later, the couple found themselves down in the dressing room. At this point, they were barely fazed by the stares they were receiving from their fellow group members.

Group three left the dressing room all at once and made their way to rink side where they could sit and wait for their turn. In a draw, Yuuri and Victor were the last of their group to skate. They sat quietly on the bench together with the other skaters, and Victor held his hand firm on Yuuri’s knee to stop the bouncing.

“Breathe, Yuuri. It’s going to be okay.” He whispered softly into his ear, and Yuuri slowed the bouncing.

“Sorry. Despite how low key this event is, I’m still nervous.”

“That’s fair.” Victor said quietly as the last pair of group two left the rink.

“ _Will group three skaters please take the ice for a ten minute warm up!_ ”

At that, all the skaters on the bench stood up and took to the ice one by one.

Yuuri looked around the arena as he skated side by side with Victor, and he gulped. The benches were way more full than they had been when they had first arrived that morning. He recognized some signs in the crowd from the bigger events and he turned to Victor, who had his eyes closed. Yuuri chose to stay quiet.

“We should get in a few flips before we are kicked off the ice, yeah?” Victor asked after a moment, and Yuuri nodded, and their warm up began.

Despite the nerves, Yuuri managed to land four of the five quad flips and he was feeling confident, even on shaky legs. Victor wrapped his arm around his shoulder and brought him close.

“I saw the signs, but just breathe. I’ll be with you.”

“ _Skaters, please exit the ice._ ”

Yuuri nodded quickly as they left the ice with the other skaters, nerves blazing, but with Victor’s arm around him, he could feel the other’s calm creeping through him. They were soon off of the ice and sitting on the bench to wait for their turn to skate.

The first skaters on the ice were much younger than Victor and Yuuri, and the nerves were visible on their faces. They both eyed the men on the bench before skating out with smiles plastered on their faces. And despite their obvious nerves, they skated an amazing routine. When they came back to step off the ice, everyone on the bench cheered for them as they made their way to the dressing room.

The next four pairs were the same, and each put on a stellar performance, with very minor errors. And each time, despite the group on the bench growing smaller, the skaters came back to encouraging cheers of luck.

Once the fifth pair had come back to rink side, Yuuri gulped and stood up, immediately grabbing Victor’s hand tightly to ground himself. Victor squeezed his hand back reassuringly before letting go so they could remove their coats to reveal their costumes. Yuuri, with help, had fashioned himself a red and black shirt, with what looked to be red ribbon wrapped around his left arm, and a full black sleeve on his right. Victor sported a simple black lightweight blazer, with a matching red top underneath. He had decided against the black tie they had been mulling over in the designing process. Each of their tops had been bedazzled one way or another by Yuuko’s triplets when they hadn’t been looking. They couldn’t complain though, they _had_ made them look better.

“We’re going to be okay, okay?” Victor said once they had stepped onto the ice, leaning over to press a quick kiss to Yuuri’s forehead. Yuuri nodded as the announcer called their names. There was a loud buzz of confusion through a good majority of the crowd, while the group that had brought signs cheered loudly behind them, causing Yuuri’s ears to ring.

Yuuri took a deep breath as they made it to center ice and he tilted his head up to look at Victor. Victor returned his gaze and gave him a smile, and as the music started, everything around them seemed to melt away and Yuuri lost himself in the performance, only concentrating on the music and the movements of his husband.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was trying to draw yuuri and victor's outfits, and then i remembered i can't draw so i scrapped it. yuuri's is kind of two of yuzuru hanyu's outfits smashed together ([one](https://68.media.tumblr.com/41cc0c6c403c2c480268c5a0cdaa4ec8/tumblr_inline_n0nysfRMxS1r1c1ip.jpg) & [two](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/62/88/c2/6288c272364b279acfdf3663a3f7cdc0.jpg)) while victor's is pretty straight forward.
> 
> also, sort of important, their free skate song is [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSXy5fPQTnI). it's unfortunately 5 seconds short, but i searched far and wide for something and i liked this one best.


	4. split jump

Mila’s eyes shot up as soon as she saw the movement in her peripherals. She stormed forward on her skates and caught Yuri’s wrist before he sent his phone flying across the ice. Again.

“ _What_ are you attempting to break your phone over this time?” she asked, not so much angry as annoyed. Yuri had become quite irritable since December, and she was tired of it.

“Those…” he trailed off, unable to come up with anything to say as he shook his head. “Those _bastards_.” He tried again, whipping around to show his phone screen to the older girl.

Mila snatched the phone out of his hand to hold it still and scrolled through the Twitter feed.

  * _i can’t believe they’re back! #fukuokaregional_
  * _victor nikiforov and katsuki yuuri just blew the rest of the pairs out of the water #fukuokaregional_
  * _ISU Reports: Victor Nikiforov and Katsuki Yuuri win gold at Fukuoka RFSC #fukuokaregional // What To Look Forward To Next Season_



It took Mila a few moments for everything to click before her eyes widened. “Wait, what is this? What are they doing?”

“That’s what I want to know. Don’t go telling people you’re retiring only to not retire.” Yuri muttered, crossing his arms after snatching his phone back from Mila.

Mila watched Yuri for a moment, and could see that his brain was working overtime with this new information. She leaned against the rink boards and sighed quietly.

“I know you wanted to win gold again competing against Yuuri.” At that, Yuri pulled an angry face, visible only momentarily before he turned his head enough that his long locks covered his expression. “You’re going to have to get past this one day.”

Yuri stayed quiet for a moment, pushing back on his blades before skating back, eyes on Mila’s. “Okay, so what are your thoughts on pai—”

“Not happening.”

Yuri clicked his tongue and pushed away once more to skate to the other side of the rink. His mind was racing as he tried to think of any clues, any reasons as to why Yuuri had lied at the Grand Prix about retiring.

Why had he said what he had said if he was going to keep competing?

Why…

Yuri slowed to a stop as he finally realized.

“ _I’m retiring from men’s singles at the end of this competition._ ”

“That _asshole._ ” And there it went, his phone, across the rink with no one to save it. The screen smashing into a million pieces for the millionth time, and Mila stood with her hand on her face, not even surprised by any of his outbursts anymore.

“What the hell are you doing? How many more phones do you need to destroy before you’re happy?” Yakov’s voice shrieked from the other end of the rink, as the phone in question had narrowly missed Georgi’s head while he was in the middle of a spin. Yuri rolled his eyes and turned his back to exit the ice.

Mila and Georgi shared looked as Yuri stepped into the arena lobby, while Yakov continued muttering under his breath as he picked up the pieces of the broken smartphone.

 

* * *

 

“Did you see the news?”

A Skype chat had opened only moments before, as Phichit sat on his bed with his laptop in front of him.

“See what? I’ve only been awake a few moments.” Leo slurred, sleep strong in his voice as he rubbed his eyes. His room was dark, with the faintest light shining through his window.

“Ah, did I wake you? I’m sorry. I’m just really excited.” Phichit said, pressing his hands together in front of him in apology.

“What’s got you so excited?” another voice rang out. The room it came from was empty, but bright. Moments later, Guang Hong fell onto his bed, sending his laptop in a frenzy of shaking until he steadied it. “Sorry. What’s happening?”

“It’s so early, what’s gotten you so riled up?” Leo mumbled into his pillow, barely audible to the others.

“Again, sorry.” Phichit said once more, feeling bad for waking Leo. “But it was the first thing I saw when I got home from practice.” The boy scrolled on his phone for a moment before aligning the screen with the laptop camera. Both boys on the other end squinted at their respective screens.

“Is that…” Leo started, before Guang Hong cut him off.

“Yuuri? Victor?”

Phichit put his phone back down and nodded, grin on his face. “Yuuri retired from _men’s singles_ , not skating completely. They just did a competition in Japan, and fans all over the place are having a field day right now.”

“How did they do at the competition? The font was too small to read.” Leo asked, turning slightly in his bed so his voice was less muffled.

Phichit reached for his phone and read the article.

“Victor and Yuuri receive gold at the Fukuoka Regional Figure Skating Competition, breaking the competition record for pairs.”

“Of course they broke a record. With those two, if they hadn’t broken any records, it would have been more shocking.” Guang Hong said. “I’m amazed none of us had heard anything.”

“I’ve spoken to Yuuri a million times since the Grand Prix and he didn’t mention anything at all, except that he was still working really hard to get better.” Phichit said, rubbing his chin. “I really hope they do all they need to do so we can see them on the road to Grand Prix.”

“Same. It would be weird not competing against them, but it will be interesting to watch them pair skate, more than they did a few years ago.” Leo said before yawning, turning his head away from his phone.

“Yeah! The Barcelona exhibition was so good.” Phichit paused for a moment before checking the time. “I wonder…”

Leaning forward, Phichit began clicking and tapping away on his laptop before the Skype calling sound kicked in. It rang, and rang, and rang, and just when he thought it was no use, a third screen opened in front of him. It was facing the ceiling of what looked to be a train, and he could hear indistinct mumbling in the background. Finally, the camera turned upright and Yuuri’s face looked back at the others, with a mask covering half of his face and a sleeping Victor on his shoulder. He looked exhausted.

“I hope I didn’t wake you.” Phichit said quietly, once more holding his hands in front of him in apology.

Yuuri shook his head as he looked at the screen, pulling his mask down with his free hand. “I can’t get comfortable enough to sleep, and I will be murdered if I move.” The man whispered into the microphone of his headphones, eyes moving to the top of Victor’s head. “How are you three doing?”

“Phichit called us.” Guang Hong said as Phichit cut in.

“Congratulations on winning gold!”

Leo, half asleep still, gave a thumbs-up to the camera.

“Ah, you saw that, did you?” Yuuri muttered quietly, reaching to pull a cheap, gold-plated medal from his jacket pocket. He held it up for the three to see.

“Are you going to aim for the international competitions?” Guang Hong asked as he shifted on his bed and onto his stomach, supporting his head in his hands.

Yuuri looked at the medal for a moment before pocketing once again. “You mean, are we aiming for Grand Prix? Maybe. We have a lot of work to do, but we have all summer. We’ll have to figure out the logistics, since we can’t represent two countries and all that.”

Phichit was about to speak before he physically deflated. “Right, that’s going to make it a bit complicated.” A moment passed before his eyes began to sparkle. “But you’re Yuuri and Victor, champions. I’m sure the ISU will help you.”

Yuuri bit the inside of his lip as he let his head rest against Victor’s. “We need to talk to ISU anyway, if we choose to compete. If we are allowed to compete, since while we aren’t the first skaters to do similar pairs, it’s not something you see at the Grand Prix. And then we have to talk to the Figure Skating Federation of Russia and the Japan Skating Federation to see about what country we would be able to represent if we are given the green light to compete.” Yuuri sighed, closing his eyes. “We may have been able to compete today, but we have a steep hill to climb.”

“If you need extra help pushing them to let you compete, we got your back.” Guang Hong offered with a grin.

“Yeah, now that we don’t have to try and compete against you of course.” Phichit added with a laugh. “We’ll definitely push back if they give you trouble. We want to see you skate!”

Yuuri smiled tiredly at his phone and nodded, gentle enough not to rouse the sleeping Victor. “Thanks guys, that will probably help a lot.” He said quietly before yawning. “I should probably try and get some sleep, but thanks for calling.”

Guang Hong and Phichit both said goodbye before Yuuri left the chat, and all was silent until there was a loud snore coming from the other participant.

“I think Leo’s down for the count.” Guang Hong whispered.

Phichit nodded. “I think I’m going to go grab some food. Have a good night, Guang Hong!”

 

* * *

 

 

Victor and Yuuri were both served large bowls of katsudon once they had arrived back home. The two were exhausted though, and once the bowls had been cleaned, the two retreated back to their, now shared, bedroom and collapsed on the bed.

Victor yawned and rubbed his eyes as he rolled onto his back. Yuuri sat on the side of the bed and started pulling off his clothes to sleep, tossing them on the floor to deal with in the morning.

“I was in a Skype call while you were asleep on the train with Phichit and Guang Hong. Leo fell asleep as soon as I answered.” Yuuri said, trying to start enough conversation to stay awake long enough to get ready for bed.

“Oh? How are they doing?” Victor asked, pushing himself up and to the foot of the bed to mirror Yuuri’s clothing removal.

“They wanted to congratulate us on the gold. News travels fast, even at small competitions.”

Victor hummed as he kicked off his pants and crawled back up on the bed to lay his head on the pillow. “Social media is great for that.”

“Then they were asking if we were going to aim for Grand Prix and while it’s a good goal, I really don’t know if we are going to be able to.”

Turning his head on the pillow, Victor looked up to Yuuri who had stood up to shimmy out of his jeans. He gave him a questioning look once he met his eye.

“Like, we’re going to have to go through so many channels in order to compete, to be _allowed_ to compete. Will it even be worth it?”

Yuuri walked to the door to turn off the light before crawling up onto the bed beside Victor, who immediately wrapped his arms around him.

“Of course it will be worth it. It’ll be something new and refreshing in competitive skating, something that people don’t see that often. We’ll get them to agree to let us skate one way or another.”

“And…” Yuuri trailed off as he pressed his forehead against Victor’s. “We have to see what country we’d be allowed to skate for.”

“I think that’s going to be the most difficult hurdle to cross, to be honest.” Victor admitted quietly, closing his eyes as he pulled Yuuri closer. “We can do it, though. We’ll represent Russia or Japan and we will skate at the Grand Prix. I can guarantee it.”

Yuuri laughed quietly. “I am so glad one of us is confident enough to say something like that. And when you say it, I believe it.”

Victor peeked open his eye to meet Yuuri’s in the dark room and he smiled. “Believe it. We will compete at the Grand Prix in Vancouver and it will be awesome.” He leaned in and brushed his lips against Yuuri’s briefly. “But sleep now, important discussions with important people later.”

Yuuri nodded and quickly found his place against Victor, nuzzling his head under the other man’s chin. “Of course.”

“Ya lyublyu tebya.” Victor mumbled into Yuuri’s hair, causing him to grin against his chest.

“I love you, too.”


	5. step sequence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> man i feel like i was writing this chapter for like ten years and its so short. like it was one of those moments were i thought it was like 3k+ and i look at the word count and its like "300 words" ....boiiii 
> 
> i stg after this we can get to the skating

The following weeks were incredibly stressful. On top of their intense daily training, Victor and Yuuri were diligently working on signing up for competitions that would let them participate, while also trying to make arrangements to meet with people in the JSF, FS Russia and ISU to gain permission to skate.

Yuuri groaned quietly as he collapsed onto the bed late one evening, dropping his phone beside him.

“What’s up?” Victor asked, his own phone pressed against his ear as he sat back against the pillows on the bed, eyeing the other man curiously.

Yuuri took a few moments to process the conversation he had just finished before speaking. “We have a meeting in Tokyo this week. We need to find a flight as soon as possible.”

Victor nodded and clicked his tongue, tossing his phone down on the bed in front of him, not unlike Yuuri had moments before.

“At least that is one step further than we are getting already.” Victor said, running his hands through his hair. “Yakov said he’d work on the Russian federation on our behalf, its just ISU we need to worry about.”

Yuuri nodded. “And if we can put everything on the table when we get to Tokyo in a few days, maybe that will be the springboard to get us where we need to be. Yashihito-san sounded very interested when I mentioned why I was calling.”

Victor reached over and tugged at Yuuri’s shirt. “I am keeping optimistic until the very end.” he said, grinning when Yuuri moved up the bed to slump against Victor, wrapping his arms around him.

“One of us has to.”

 

The following morning, Yuuri managed to find a deal for the last minute flight to Tokyo for the both of them, along with a hotel near where the meeting was going to be held. He let out a breath once everything had been reserved, relieved that he had found something with such short notice. That day, they cut practice in half to pack and take in an early night as their flight was first thing the next morning, well before the late spring sun rose.

 

“Thank you for letting us come in for a meeting so soon, Yashihito-san.” Yuuri said, bowing low as Victor followed suit. “It’s very much appreciated. I’m Katsu—”

“Oh, I know who you are, Yuuri-kun, and Victor of course. Come, come.”

Victor and Yuuri shared a look before following Yashihito down a long hallway of offices. He turned into one of the rooms to the left, where a large round table sat in the middle. There were already two others sitting down as Yashihito sat next to one of the women.

They made quick introductions before sitting down as well.

“Basically, today’s meeting was mostly just to see, _hypothetically_ , if we were to participate in ISU events, would we be able to represent Japan? Or would we be representing Russia?” Yuuri asked, unsure of how to go about wording it all.

“We know that the situation is a bit unusual, and we have to see if we would be able to compete in the first place. We haven’t been able to get in touch with anyone yet, though.” Victor added hurriedly, glancing over at Yuuri as he did so. Yuuri nodded.

The three executives looked at one another before the woman in the middle spoke up.

“I hear what you are putting down, and honestly, I’m intrigued. The three of us saw your performance in Fukuoka online and we were very impressed. That performance was huge news, you know. And you know personally, I think it’s time for similar pairs to be able to compete.” She said, leaning forward on the table, clasping her hands together in front of her. “So, if we can help you get a push up, we’ll be here for you to do so. However, representing Japan might not be the way it will go.”

“Not that we don’t want you to be representing Japan, of course!” the other woman was quick to throw in, and the three nodded.

“Right, but you are both top athletes, and as much as you, Victor, have been out of the spotlight for the last few years, you are still Russia’s pride and joy.”

“Don’t tell Yurio that.” Victor whispered, causing Yuuri to snort.

“Sorry.” He muttered, covering his mouth as the three across the table looked at him curiously. “Victor is everyone’s pride and joy.” He said finally, dropping his hand from his face.

Victor gasped with mock shock as he turned to Yuuri before looking back to the three, smiling. “What are you meaning by that, though? Russia’s pride and joy and all that.”

The woman in the middle sighed quietly. “While we _would_ love for you to represent Japan, or even both countries, you will more likely be representing Russia.”

“Is there any legal paperwork that I would have to do? Like, do I have to become a Russian citizen? Like, is that even possible? Or…”

“No, no. Nothing like that.” She said, shaking her head. “That would only be more difficult, honestly. Ah, Mai, what time is it?”

The other woman looked at her watch. “Just after three.”

“Which makes it what time in Moscow?”

“Nine in the morning.” Yoshihito piped in, startling both women beside him. He smirked and turned back to Yuuri and Victor.

“Nine, right. Yoshi, can you please get in touch with Mr. Kogan?”

“Of course, Seiko-san.” He said, reaching for the phone on the table.

“I hope you have better luck than I have been having.” Victor said. “I’ve had to get my people in Russia to get in touch with him.”

“Your people?” Yuuri asked, amusement in his voice.

“Yeah. My people. I have people.”

“Does Yakov know he’s one of your people?”

“Hi, yes, hello. I’m Mr. Yoshihito from the JSF. Hello, yes, I was wondering if Mr. Kogan was available?” Everyone else in the room shut up at that and waited. Yoshihito looked around the table, a smirk growing on his face. “Excellent, thank you.” He reached forward and pressed a button on the phone, and soon quiet music was playing through the speaker.

“Did you seriously just get through with one phone call?” Victor asked incredulously.

“I have my ways, Mr. Nikiforov.”

Victor looked between the man and Yuuri, eyebrows raised. “Can he be one of my people?”

Yuuri snorted again and rolled his eyes as the music on the phone cut off.

“Kogan speaking.”

 

The meeting went smoother than both Victor and Yuuri had anticipated. They had explained their case to those sitting in on the call to the Russian Federation, who, surprisingly, sounded just as intrigued as those in the meeting with the JSF.

“We’ll get in touch with the ISU on your behalf.” Kogan had said near the end of the call. “We will sort things out for you; we know how busy you will be if you are given the chance to compete.”

“I know I was a bit on the pessimistic side before.” Yuuri started, hooking his pinky onto Victor’s as they walked towards their hotel. “But after the meeting and the phone call, I am feeling rejuvenated. Like, we can do this. We will do this. We’ll be leading the way with a whole new category of competitive skating. We’ll be like, what’s the word…”

“Trailblazers.” Victor supplied as he dropped Yuuri’s pinky to take his hand properly.

“Yeah!” Yuuri beamed as they continued down the street before turning into a park. They hadn’t made plans for the evening considering they didn’t know how late the meeting would go, and now had the entire city of Tokyo in their grasp. They were surprised when they saw that it wasn’t too late at all, and the late afternoon sun was still shining bright over the city.

“Shall we grab some dinner, love?” Victor asked as they strolled through the park, still in the general direction of their hotel. “We can have some champagne, and celebrate our days accomplishment.”

“I would love dinner and champagne.”

“Sixteen flutes of it?”

Yuuri shot Victor a look before pushing him away. “Shut _up_.”

Victor stumbled but he laughed loud and immediately found his way back to Yuuri’s side once more, wrapping his arm around the other man’s waist. “I’m sorry, lyubov moya. You know you will never live it down.”

Yuuri leaned into Victor’s side and groaned. “I’m never drinking again.”

Victor took the chance and leaned over, pressing a kiss to the top of Yuuri’s head. “I’m sorry. Where should we go for dinner?”

Yuuri looked up and grinned. “Well, I feel like we won today, so let’s get some katsudon.”

Victor smirked and nodded. “Katsudon for my katsudon. Sounds good. We’ll work out double hard tomorrow to make up for it.”

Yuuri leaned up to Victor’s ear with a sly grin on his face. “Or tonight,” he whispered quietly, biting Victor’s earlobe gently.

Victor’s face turned a vibrant shade of red at that, and Yuuri could only laugh and pull the man along with him.

“Y-Yuuri!”


	6. four skating

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surpriiiiiiiise

“Beka, one more time!” Yuri called, skating towards the other man with determination in his eyes. “Let’s try a triple.”

“A triple? We’ve barely been able to do a double.” Otabek said, cautiously. Yuri had been reckless the last couple weeks since his arrival in St. Petersburg, and he was starting to get worried.

“Just once. We can practice other things after, I swear.” Yuri said, grabbing Otabek’s hand and tugging him to gain speed on the ice. “We have to win.”

“Are you really sure about this though? Yuuri and Victor have been practicing for much, _much_ longer than we have. We’ve only been at this for like two weeks.”

Yuri stopped and whipped his head to look at Otabek. “We at least have to try.”

Yuri wasn’t even sure if they’d be allowed to compete, but he had read in a text from Yuuko that Victor and Yuuri were trying their damnedest to get to any competition they could.

The two picked up speed through crossovers over the end of the rink after that, before Otabek’s hand moved to Yuri’s waist to lift him up over his head. His heart pound hard in his chest every time they attempted a lift, and every time he threw Yuri into the air, he thought he’d die until he was back safely in his arms. As he did just that, Yuri tightened his arms and legs to twist, only managing to get around twice before landing in Otabek’s arms.

“Shit.” Yuri mumbled, as he was let back down onto the ice before they both stopped. “Shit, we need to go again.”

“Yura, no. We need to take a break before one of us gets seriously hurt.”

“One more time, I swear, Beka.”

Otabek sighed, weak to the other man’s pleas. He was weak to the other man, period. Sometimes he hated how much he loved him.

“One more time.”

“ _Are you really going to go through with this?_ ” a voice rang out from the side of the rink before the two could start again. Yuri only rolled his eyes as he pulled at Otabek to start skating. “ _What about your singles? You’d easily take gold with Katsuki out of the picture, what are you doing?_ ”

“I can still do both, Yakov. Give me a break.” Yuri called back before the two rounded the end of the rink once more, going into the lift before the twist. This time Yuri made it around three times, but Otabek’s grip as he came back down was too shaky, nearly causing a disaster.

“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.” Otabek said quickly as he let Yuri back on his feet, feeling horrible for nearly killing his boyfriend.

“Hey, hey. It’s fine.” Yuri mumbled, low enough for anyone else to be none the wiser to his soft tone. “It’s okay, I’m okay. We’ll stop for now; I know you’re tired. Sorry for pushing you.”

“Get a room!” Mila shouted from the side of the rink, and Yuri furrowed his brow and turned around.

“Fuck off!”

“Hey, hey.” Otabek said quietly, Yuri’s attention turning back to him immediately. His hand moved up to rest on the younger man’s face before leaning to press a kiss to his forehead. Despite the bright red across his cheeks, the action seemed to calm him as he let out a breath.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay. Let’s work on our single free skates for a while. We have an early plane to catch, remember?”

Yuri nodded and leaned forward, resting his forehead against Otabek’s shoulder. He stayed still for a moment before standing upright. “One more hour and we can head out.”

 

“What are _they_ doing here?” Yuri cried as soon as he walked into the Figure Skating Federation of Russia’s office lobby.

All heads whipped towards the door at his voice, and one man in particular was the first to break the following silence.

“Yurio!” Victor greeted, walking towards where Yurio stood, Otabek still stuck in the doorway behind his boyfriend.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Yurio asked again, finally stepping into the lobby so Otabek could step inside.

“Same thing as you, I’d imagine.” Another voice joined the mix. “I’m Mr. Kogan, we spoke on the phone, Mr. Plisetsky.”

Yuri looked at the man before shaking the hand that had been offered to him. “Right, sorry. It’s nice to meet you.” He said, his tone of voice changing drastically as Otabek nonchalantly took his other hand.

Kogan lead the four skaters through the halls into a conference room, not unlike the one that Victor and Yuuri had been in weeks before in Tokyo.

Once they were all seated at the table, Yuuri and Victor on one side, Otabek and Yurio on the other, Kogan spoke. “As you know, we’ve been trying to work out a deal with the ISU to let you compete. Surprisingly, you aren’t the only ones trying to challenge the long-standing rule of, ‘one Man, one Lady,’ in pairs and ice dancing. However, you are the first world champions to come forward. You could make the change happen.” The man around the table shared looks as the words processed. “The vice-president of the ISU will be joining us here today, and we will get to the bottom of this no matter what. It’s already been passed within the federation that you will both be representing Russia, if and when the time comes.”

“I can still represent Kazakhstan if I skate singles, correct?” Otabek asked, already knowing the answer, but needing confirmation nonetheless.

“Yes, of course. You’ll be free to represent Kazakhstan, just as Mr. Katsuki would be free to represent Japan, should he decide to come out of retirement.”

Once the vice-president had arrived, the meeting started. Questions were fired off from each man at the table, and answers were given. The clock overhead ticked loudly as it felt like they were going in circles.

Yuuri, at one point, could feel his head starting to swim. He didn’t want to hear the line, ‘one Man, one Lady,’ for the rest of his life. He knew it was going to be an uphill battle, but it was starting to feel like a lost cause as the vice-president pushed back.

The other three felt similar as they defended themselves. They had the upper hand with their titles and influence, they could make similar-pairs a competitive discipline. If there were already others wanting to participate, they wouldn’t _need_ to compete with mixed pairs, they wouldn’t _have_ the upper hand with performance and technical aspects if they were competing against all men, and all ladies were competing against all ladies.

Hours ticked by slowly as they continued the meeting. Every question starting to repeat, though all worded differently. Victor’s throat started to burn from speaking, the air conditioning in the room making the air dry. His voice started to become raspy as he continued to speak, to fight for their right to compete.

“Please, let us skate.” They had all said, once, twice, three times over before the vice-president of the International Skating Union leaned forward to rest his head in his hands, elbows on the table. He sighed.

“At this time I cannot make a decision, I will have to go over everything with the president.” He finally said, lifting his head back up and looking at the four skaters in front of him. “I can tell you’re all very passionate about competing, but this has been a rule since the beginning. Competitive ice dancing and pairs is, ‘one Man, one Lady,’ and it’s going to be a hard thing to change, and I hope you are understanding that.” The men all nodded. “Please, by all means, continue practicing and continue getting into competitions. You will be informed of any decisions as soon as a verdict has been reached.”

With that, the man stood from his seat at the table and bowed before leaving the room with Mr. Kogan. The latter returned a few moments later, sighing.

“Sorry that wasn’t as productive as I had hoped.” He said apologetically, rubbing his face with his hands. “I’m sorry for calling you all the way from Japan for this.”

Victor shook his head slowly before resting his chin on his hand. “It’s okay, I got to see my dear Yurochka”

“Shut up, old man.” The younger man mumbled across from him, Otabek immediately reaching for his hand to calm any outbursts that might follow. Yurio squeezed his boyfriend’s hand tightly before turning to look at Kogan. “Thank you for at least trying.”

“Y-yes, it was no problem leaving Japan. I think we put a bigger seed in that man’s head than if we had discussed this over the phone. He wouldn’t have told us to keep practicing if there wasn’t a chance.” Yuuri said, feeling a bit more confident as the entire meeting slowly started to replay in his head. It had been a lot to take in, and he was going to need a few more _days_ to process all of it.

The four (and Kogan) left the conference room a short while later, and after saying goodbye to the general director of the federation, the skaters left the building. There was an awkward silence between them as they stood outside the main lobby of the building, not sure where to go from there. Yuri and Otabek arriving had definitely thrown Yuuri and Victor for a figurative loop; they hadn’t expected to see the duo until one competition or another.

Yurio was the first to speak up, looking up at Otabek. “Let’s go back to my granddad’s, he’ll have pirozhki for us.” He said, taking Otabek’s arm and walking towards the direction of his granddad’s building. Yuuri and Victor looked as they walked, and both jumped slightly as the younger Yuri whipped his head back to look at them. “Are you coming or not?”

 

Dinner was pleasant despite the fact that Yuri pretended he didn’t want his guests there, even though he had been the one to invite them. Everyone gathered around the table knew better, though didn’t say a word on the subject. They enjoyed catching up and passing tips around their new discipline, and discussed competitions that Yuuri and Victor had so far registered for.

“We’re reworking our routines because we are currently up against mixed-pairs, so we need to fix our elements to even out the playing field.” Yuuri explained, grinning when he realized that the pirozhki Yurio’s granddad had made had been the special katsudon version.

“What? Are you saying you’re too good?” Yurio snapped before clearing his throat.

“N-no, but when you have world champions up against, you know what? I can’t word it in a way that makes it sound p-polite.” Yuuri spluttered, feeling his face heat up as he dropped his food back on his plate. “N-never mind.”

Victor laughed softly beside him and reached for his free hand, his thumb brushing over the ring that still sat snug around his finger.

“Beginners against veterans.” He said quietly. “Even if we are competing in a new discipline, it still isn’t exactly fair to the rest of the skaters when we have far more experience. I kind of feel bad about what happened in Fukuoka. We were in the highest tier and we didn’t really belong there.”

“The second place skaters were spectacular though. We did steal that gold from them, I agree.” Yuuri said, frowning.

Yurio, on the other hand, rolled his eyes. “Yeah, just rub it in why don’t you.”

“They’d only be rubbing it in if those silver medalists were sitting at the table with us, Yura.” Otabek said quietly, squeezing Yuri’s hand while his other held onto his food.

Yurio grunted at his boyfriend before taking a bite of his dinner.

The night continued as such before Victor and Yuuri decided to call it a night. They’d been in Moscow only for a couple days, and the jetlag was still screwing around with their sleep schedules, and after a long day stuck in a conference room, the two just wanted to sleep.

Their farewells were short as they left Yurio’s grandfather’s house before making their way back to their hotel with a bag full of extra katsudon pirozhki just for Yuuri and Victor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hoo boy


	7. loop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> forgive me, there are some time jumps. i couldn't get around them.

Despite the hot summer sun shining down on Hasetsu, Victor and Yuuri were inside the Ice Castle. On one hand, it was nice to get out of the heat, but on the other, it made the rink busy because everyone else wanted to get out of the heat.

“I’m sorry, guys. The rink keeps getting booked up with birthday parties since school is out for the next few weeks.” Yuuko had said one morning as the first guests of the first party started to arrive. “We haven’t seen this much business in a long time and the higher ups keep booking in people. Something about paying customers… ”

Yuuri chuckled quietly and stood up from the bench once his skates were off. “It’s okay, Yuu, really.” He said, clapping her on the shoulders lightly with a grin. “If Victor and I have to practice through the night, we will. We both appreciate you letting us use the ice when we are able to.”

“I’ve been saying since the beginning that I’ll pay to rent the rink.” Victor said quietly as he unlaced his skates.

Yuuko frowned and shook her head. “No, that’s not right. I couldn’t ask you to do that. No, the rink is free for you to use between ten and eight during the night and morning, I just feel so bad.”

“Yuuuuko.” Yuuri whined, shaking her shoulders lightly. “Please, calm down. It’s okay, I promise. We’re going to make it work.”

“But—“

“Stop!”

Yuuko sighed quietly, her shoulders relaxing under Yuuri’s hands. “Okay, okay. Sorry.”

“Besides, we’re heading to Russia in a few days, so stop stressing.”

Yuuko poked out her bottom lip and nodded. “I know, I know. It’s going to be weird.”

Yuuri finally dropped his hands from the girl’s shoulders and nodded. “It will definitely be weird, but book in all the groups that you want and don’t worry about us now, okay?”

Nodding again, Yuuko took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Okay. Okay. I’m going to go deal with these children now.”

Victor and Yuuri both watched as she scrambled back to the main lobby to start doling out rental skates. The two quietly packed up their things before heading back to Yuuri’s house.

 

“Are we really going to be able to practice at your old rink?” Yuuri asked once sprawled on his bed, muscles aching from that morning’s practice. “It might be weird.”

Victor regarded Yuuri for a moment before going back to packing his clothes in his suitcase.

“It will be fine. Yakov didn’t sound _happy_ last time I spoke to him but also he didn’t say we weren’t welcome to skate when I mentioned we’ve basically come nocturnal in order to train.” There was a brief pause as Victor huffed and zipped his suitcase shut. “Besides, _if_ we are going to be representing Russia, we may as well train in Russia.”

“I was representing Japan and training in Detroit.” Yuuri deadpanned as he sat up on his elbows.

Victor waved his hand in front of his face and shook his head. “Regardless. We’ll have a place to train that isn’t constantly booked for birthday parties and other events.”

There was a silence that filled the room with that, and Yuuri’s mind was racing. A frown caused his eyebrows to furrow as something else came to him. “We haven’t heard from ISU.”

Victor stood up from his suitcase with a grunt before stretching. His eyes darted around the room for any of his other belongings he’d need to take to Russia with them. “You’re right, we haven’t.” his own eyebrows furrowing. “It’s been like a month and a half since we were in Moscow, too!”

Yuuri pushed himself up to sit properly before rubbing his eyes with the backs of his hands. “What if we aren’t even going to be able to compete? We were able to get into that last competition in Tokyo a couple weeks ago.”

“And won.” Victor muttered, eyeing the matching gold medals hanging over Yuuri’s mirror.

“We haven’t been turned away from any competitions since, and we have a tight schedule come September in Russia, but…”

Victor did one last look around the room before sighing softly, tired from that morning. He wandered to the bed and crawled up beside Yuuri, his arms wrapping around his husbands waist loosely.

“We just have to think positive. Maybe Yurio and Otabek have heard something. We’ll find out when we get to St. Petersburg next week.”

 

Yurio and Otabek had _not_ heard anything from the ISU, and Yurio had had some rather colourful words for Yuuri and Victor when the pair had shown up at the rink a couple days after arriving in St. Petersburg, when their jetlag had mostly worn off.

“We haven’t heard a single peep out of them!” Yurio said before trailing off into indecipherable muttering.

Otabek sighed quietly and let his hand move to rest on the younger man’s shoulder to calm him down. “It’s pretty stressful, since we’re still both competing in singles. We don’t know if we should be practicing more for the pairs or—”

“Have you figured out your routines? Can we see them?” Victor asked, jumping slightly on the balls of his feet as he looked between the two skaters in front of him. Yuuri couldn’t help but smile at how excited his husband got.

“I mean, I don’t see why not?” Otabek said as Yurio groaned, though didn’t outright _protest_.

“We only have the short program.” Yurio muttered. “We’re still working out sequences for the free.”

Otabek skated over to the stereo on the side of the rink to set them up while Yurio moved to stand in their starting position. Victor and Yuuri stepped up into the stands to watch, the other skaters in the rink moving to the sides to give the two room to skate. They knew better than to get in Yurio’s way.

The music choice was good for the pair as they started their program. Their components were rather easy as they still struggled with the twist lifts, and Yuuri and Victor could see the shaky hold in their death spiral. The spins and jumps were on point, however, with quad-throws for each of them, and spinning in time with each other. As the program came to a close, Yuuri and Victor couldn’t help but cheer. Yurio, visible from even the stands, rolled his eyes at their reaction as they once again met at the boards.

“That was very well done!” Yuuri said, smiling as he looked between the two skaters.

Yurio clicked his tongue, but Otabek bowed slightly. “Thank you. Any suggestions?”

The question, albeit an innocent one, was a mistake. Victor cleared his throat, and Yuuri and Yurio both knew what was coming from a mile away as he gave his two cents on each missed step. However, not only did he point out the missed steps, he gave the two constructive criticism that would definitely help them aim for the top.

“If you’re so wise on the subject of pairs skating, let’s see you skate!” Yurio finally said, crossing his arms with a frown, tired of hearing Victor’s rather _useful_ tips.

Yuuri and Victor shared a look before nodding.

“Give us a couple minutes to get into our skates.” Victor said before they both made their way back to the change room to get ready.

It wasn’t long before the two were stepping onto the ice, and Victor moved to the stereo with their music. Yuuri did a quick couple laps to stretch his tired legs before they both skated around to meet at center ice, getting in position to start the short program they had been refining over the last several months.

As soon as the music started, the skaters were off. They did each jump in quick succession with their complicated step sequences and spins. Despite their few days off, they skated like they hadn’t been off of the ice at all. Victor’s hold as he held Yuuri across the rink was strong before tossing him up into the air, pulling off a triple twist with ease. The program continued with more step sequences and a combination spin before the song finally came to an end.

“What the fuck? Beka! We need to work harder, let’s go!” was all Yurio had to say as he dragged his boyfriend back onto the ice, completely ignoring Yuuri and Victor for the rest of the evening.

 

Both pairs continued to practice for days and weeks, making themselves stronger in all the ways they could, perfecting their sequences and their twists, and becoming more in sync with one another.

It wasn’t until Yuuri’s phone started buzzing incessantly one morning late August that things started to fall into place. Yuuri blindly reached for his phone and made out the blurry face of Yuuko on his screen. He grunted quietly as he answered the call to screaming on the other end causing him to nearly throw his phone across the bedroom.

“Wh-what? Slow down.” he said, voice raspy with sleep. He could feel Victor stir beside him, the arms that were around his waist tightening. He glanced at the clock to read a very angry, red 3:49am on the bedside alarm clock. He internally groaned as he waited for the chaos on the other end of the line to cease.

“Yuuri, are you awake?” Yuuko asked, frantic. Her voice only made Yuuri start to worry. Were his parents okay? Was Yuuko okay? Was Takeshi okay?”

“Sort of.” He replied, clearing his throat. “It’s just about four. What’s going on?”

“Assignments! The Grand Prix assignments!” Yuuko cried, though the words weren’t exactly processing in Yuuri’s brain, especially not as Victor’s head moved onto his thigh, tired eyes looking up at him, pleading for him to go back to sleep.

“What are you talking about the Grand Prix at 4 o’clock in the morning for?” Yuuri mumbled, rubbing his eyes with his free hand.

Yuuko sighed on the other end of the phone. “The Grand Prix assignments, Yuuri! Listen.”

Yuuri sighed back as he could feel sleep trying to pull him back, but something that Yuuko had said made him snap to reality.

“Wait, what? Say that again.”

Yuuko grumbled before clearing her throat. “Similar pairs, skating at Skate America and representing Russia, Yuri Katsuki and Victor Nikiforov. And then it goes to say, similar pairs skating at Cup of China and representing Russia, Yuri Katsuki and Victor Nikiforov. Skating similar pairs, skating at Skate Canada for Russia, Yuri Plisetsky and Otabek Altin. Skating similar pairs, skating at Cup of China, Yuri Plisetsky and Otabek Altin.” The girl on the line breathed heavily as though she had just said everything in one go. Which, given her excited state, she may have. “You did it. You got them to give you a chance. You’ve been _chosen_ for your chance to skate.

Yuuri’s eyes were wide as the words slowly made sense in her head. He looked down at Victor, who looked back at him just as tired as he had been before, though upon seeing the look on Yuuri’s face, he almost grew concerned.

“Yuuri?” Victor asked tiredly, pushing himself up onto his arms, ready to hug the man if he needed comforting. But Yuuri didn’t need comforting at all, no, he needed someone to pinch him. He had to be dreaming. He pinched his leg and winced.

“Yuuri are you still there?” Yuuko asked on the other line as the smile finally broke across Yuuri’s face. He nodded.

“Y-yeah, I’m still here. Thank you for calling me.”

“Of course. I’ll let you go back to sleep. Sorry for waking you, I just knew it couldn’t wait.”

Yuuri hung up his phone soon after and set it on the bedside table before looking at Victor, who watched him with curious eyes in the darkness of the room, the red light of the alarm clock being the only light around.

“Is everything okay?” Victor asked, shifting to lean against the headboard.

“More than okay. We, oh man.” Yuuri took a deep breath to calm his nerves before shifting to sit closer to Victor, wrapping his arms around his middle and resting his chin on his shoulder. “We are skating at Skate America and the Cup of China.”

“Oh, I thought it was something seri—wait, _what_?”

Yuuri nodded, pulling his head back from Victor as the other man twisted his body to look at him. “Yuuko just read it, and we’re going to be skating at those events in similar pairs, representing Russia.”

“For real?”

“For real. With Yurio and Otabek at the Cup of China.”

The two stayed quiet with silent excitement radiating between the two of them before they both, finally, drifted off to sleep.

Of course, only to be woken two hours later once the news reached Yuri and Otabek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the victuuri short program song can be found [here](https://youtu.be/QOWLVSId6ck?t=28m15s)
> 
> the otayuri short program song can be found [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmn1LvbqsaM) (short programs are supposed to be 2min20, but as most short programs go, the songs are cut to size by people that can use music editors. i am not one of those people.)


	8. salchow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> victor and yuuri's   
> • [short program](https://youtu.be/QOWLVSId6ck?t=28m15s)  
> • [free skate](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSXy5fPQTnI)
> 
> yuri and otabek's  
> • [short program](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmn1LvbqsaM)  
> • [free skate](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPwZaQfoIbU)
> 
> this has been the last of the major time jumps, but those were unavoidable.

With the assignments announced, you couldn’t hope to find Victor or Yuuri (or Yurio or Otabek, for that matter) anywhere outside of the arena. Their training had gone into overtime as they continued to refine their programs, wanting them to be spot on for their major international debut. The pair had become so in sync with one another that it was even showing at home in their apartment.

Yuuri and Victor had competed in a few smaller competitions in St. Petersburg since their arrival and had done nothing short of spectacular. Yurio and Otabek had tried to register for the same events, but they had been late coming into the discipline and had missed the cut off days for the early season regional competitions. But with their names secured for the Grand Prix series, they weren’t too upset.

 

It was the morning of the first events for the Skate America competition when Yuuri finally started to feel the nerves. He’d been able to control them the week leading up to and through the flight from Russia, but the morning of he was starting to feel queasy. He groaned as he wrapped his arms across his stomach and rolled onto his side on the hotel bed. Victor had walked out of the bathroom just when he had moved and sighed quietly, toothbrush hanging out of his mouth. He stepped back into the bathroom momentarily to finish up before making his way to the bed, sitting down lightly on the mattress beside Yuuri. Victor let his fingers brush through Yuuri’s hair gently and watched as the man’s face started to relax.

“Breathe, my love.” Victor said softly, continuing to comb his hand through his hair. “Deep breaths.”

Yuuri did as he was told, taking deep but shaky breaths and letting them out slowly. Having Victor there to help him through these moments made them ten times easier, but they were never really _easy_ to get through regardless. His stomach was still feeling like he was going to be sick, but he felt like he had gained a few hours before he’d actually _be_ sick.

Yuuri opened his eyes and tried to give Victor a smile. “Thank you.”

Victor shook his head before leaning down to press his lips to the side of Yuuri’s head. “You don’t need to thank me every time, Yuuri.” He said quietly as he sat back up, glancing at the clock. “And I hate to pull you out of bed when you feel like this still, but we’re running late. Will you be okay?”

Yuuri gave a weak nod as he pushed himself up from lying down. “I don’t really have much of a choice.”

 

The pair made it to the arena just in the nick of time and found their way to the change room where their group was to meet. They definitely received a few stares as they walked into the room where the other skaters were getting ready, fixing their costumes and tying their skates. They nodded to their opponents and found a corner to get their skates on and unruffled any creases in their shirts. As they waited to take the ice, Yuuri looked around the room to analyze all the other men they were going to be competing against. There were two American pairs, a Chinese pair, a pair from Japan, which startled Yuuri, he hadn’t been expecting that at all. There was also a pair from South Korea frantically trying to get organized having arrived even later than Yuuri and Victor.

The discipline was more popular than Yuuri had expected, and it was the four of them that had tipped the ISU on the decision. He felt his heart clench with something like pride and he couldn’t help but grin.

“Come on, love. Let’s go.” Victor said quietly, leaning over from his spot on the bench.

Yuuri jumped slightly but saw all the other skaters getting to their feet and following one of the event organizers out of the room to rink side.

 

One of the American pairs was the first to skate, and the couple’s movements captivated Victor and Yuuri both. They’d been competing mostly with mixed pairs up until then, so being up against other men was something new to watch. Yuuri glanced at Victor who watched the skaters with his free hand on his chin, deep in thought. Yuuri squeezed Victor’s other hand before turning back to the ice. He knew Victor was already planning for the next season by watching, and he didn’t want to disturb him.

Victor and Yuuri were the fourth to skate in their group, and after watching another two performances, they were confident in their program. And it showed as they skated through, forgetting everyone and everything around them and only concentrating on each other as they took off into their jumps before coming together to spin, clutching onto one another. As the program came to a close, they raised their arms before bowing before skating towards the kiss and cry.

 

“Yuuri!” a familiar voice cried out, louder than anything else as Yuuri and Victor moved through the hallways of the arena. They had been stuck with reporters since they had finished their program and were in desperate need of water.

Yuuri spun around just in time for a pair of arms to wrap around him, the person in question was a complete blur, but he couldn’t _not_ recognize the man, face covered with a black mask and his tired old black hat.

“P-Phichit!” Yuuri stuttered, momentarily winded by the impact. Once he had grounded himself again, he let his arms wrap around the other man. “I didn’t realize you were skating this weekend.”

Phichit pulled back from Yuuri before nodding towards Victor. “Ah, I wasn’t actually assigned until a few days ago! I didn’t do very well last season as you might remember. After the Grand Prix, everything kind of went downhill with Celestino and Worlds was…” Phichit made a face before shaking his head, a smile making his way back to his lips. “But, someone had to drop out due to injury and I was the top of the wait list, so here I am.”

Yuuri did remember the few phone calls with Phichit after everything had seemingly fallen to pieces around Phichit, but despite all that, he was overwhelmed with happiness to see him at the competition. They hadn’t seen each other in person since the Grand Prix Final banquet, and though they wanted to, their schedules never managed to overlap. Phichit grabbed Yuuri to hug him again, mostly to make up for missed time.

“I am so glad to see you here, though. There’s so many new faces this year, I would have even settled to see JJ.” Phichit mumbled into Yuuri’s shoulder before pulling back.

Yuuri laughed and could sense Victor starting to get antsy beside him. “I can only imagine what that feels like. We were going to get some drinks, but how about we grab some dinner instead?” Yuuri asked, glancing over to Victor, who nodded enthusiastically.

Phichit nodded as well with a grin wide on his face. “Definitely. I don’t actually skate until tomorrow, but I wanted to come and see you two skate today. You were fantastic, and you took a strong lead!”

Yuuri could feel his face flush at the compliments as the three made their way to the main entrance of the building, to start their search for something to eat in the unfamiliar city.

 

Yuuri and Victor stood in their final position center ice; with Yuuri’s hand gently resting on Victor’s waist, while Victor’s sat lightly on Yuuri’s cheek. Both of their free arms were out at their side, and the pair was breathing heavily post-performance. The audience around them screamed and cheered, calling their names but they couldn’t focus on anything but each other. Victor was the first to break into a bright smile before leaning in to steal a chaste kiss. Yuuri couldn’t stop the smile from forming on his face soon after as they finally broke apart to bow. They both skated towards the kiss and cry, picking up stuffed animals and flowers on the way, as the girls skated around them to pick up everything else.

As they stepped off of the ice and put on their guards, with some difficulty from the items in their hands, they started to comprehend the crowd’s reaction.

They both sat down and waited for the score, and when it was announced, the crowd was damn near _deafening_. Yuuri’s eyes were wide as he read the number over, and over, and Victor’s arms were wrapped around him, absolutely vibrating. Yuuri couldn’t tell if Victor was laughing or crying, but there were definitely tears in his eyes, as he looked over, dumbstruck. He’d never seen any pairs land a score like they had.

Victor and Yuuri had taken gold at Skate America, and were well on their way to the Grand Prix Final.  

* * *

 

Otabek watched as Yuri paced back and forth, playing with the hem of the white button down he had yet to tuck into his black trousers. Yuri had managed to settle momentarily to tie up his skates, but he was back on his feet pacing, making Otabek dizzier than he really wanted to be minutes before going onto the ice. He should have been used to Yuri’s mood by now, the previous weekend bringing the news of Victor and Yuuri’s success. It lit a fire under Yuri’s ass, and Otabek had tried to find any way possible to, not so much put it out, but calm it.

“ _Will the men’s similar pairs make their way to the ice for their warm up._ ”

At the voice overhead, Otabek stood and pulled Yuri out of his trance.

“It’s our turn to warm up. We’re going to be fine.” He said, relieved to see Yuri’s features somewhat relax.

The younger man nodded and took a deep breath. “We’re going to crush those bastards.” He muttered under his breath before hurriedly tucking in his shirt and walking towards the gate to the ice. Otabek could only sigh, because he knew this was as calm as his boyfriend was going to get over the next few months.

Their short program, for what it was worth, could have been better. Yuri grumbled as they sat in the kiss and cry, but despite that, Otabek was pleased with their earning second place, just behind one pair from Canada. With the amount of time they had had to practice, between practicing for their singles programs, second was a complete surprise for him. Yuri, however, seemed to think they could have done much better.

“I messed up taking off into that salchow, but it will be better tomorrow. We’ll pull ahead later. If we screw up, we have more time to fix our mistakes in the end of the free skate.” Yuri muttered as they were ushered out of the kiss and cry and back to the change room. Otabek let his hand move to rest on the other man’s back, squeezing his tense shoulder before rubbing slow circles.

“You were amazing nonetheless, Yura. We’ll pick it back up. Just breathe, please.” Otabek said softly as they made their way to one of the benches in the change room.

The two removed their skates in silence before packing them up for the night. They needed to get back to the hotel quickly, as both of their short programs for the singles were the following morning.

 

It was safe to say that Yuri and Otabek had both taken strong leads in the singles the following day, leaving the third place skater in the dust, so to speak. Yuri definitely felt way better after the slip up he still believed was his own fault the day before, and he was in much higher spirits. Otabek couldn’t stop the smile, despite coming in second, he was happy to see the other man not on a rampage for a change. They enjoyed watching the rest of the skaters that day before sharing a nice meal together at the restaurant in their hotel.

“You know, I think this is really one of our first _dates_.” Otabek said as he twirled the pasta in his plate. The man across from him nearly flung his fork at the statement.

“B-Beka!” he yelped, cheeks turning an alarming shade of pink, which only made Otabek grin. The younger man was so easy to catch off guard, and he never tired of it.

“Well, it’s true. Our ‘going out’ usually consists of going to the ice rink, where we practice and practice and practice, and then we go back to your apartment and crash because we are too tired to do anything else.” Otabek said with a shrug before scooping the food into his mouth.

Yuri watched Otabek for a moment, his mouth opening and closing, somewhat resembling a fish. He was at a loss for words; this subject was still, despite how long they really had been together, was still quite new to him.

“I, uh,” he started, not really sure of what to say. His face couldn’t be redder; it probably matched the sauce in the bowl sitting in front of the other. “We, uh, we’ll go on real dates.” He finally said, quickly and quietly, Otabek nearly hadn’t heard him. “If, uh, if that’s what you want.”

Otabek slowly nodded as he set down his fork to reach for Yuri’s free hand. “I would love nothing less.”

 

The following day, Yuri and Otabek had successfully secured gold for Skate Canada International in men’s similar pairs. They shared the top of the podium that afternoon, and a kiss fueled by that success that evening when they returned to their hotel after another date, this time featuring one (1) candle between them.

“And they say romance is dead.” Yuri had mumbled when the waitress had lit the long stemmed candle on the table.

“Really brings out the fire in your eyes.” Otabek found himself replying.

“You _really_ have a thing for my eyes.”

Otabek opened his mouth to speak, but stopped himself just short of embarrassing himself. Instead he nodded, and decided to keep his thoughts about how he really just had a thing for Yuri in general to himself.

 

With the men’s singles out of the way, Yuri and Otabek were on their way to the Cup of China with gold and silver medals, respectively. Spirits were high, and Yuri was looking forward to competing against ‘the old man and the pig.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> two chapters to go!


	9. lutz

Yuuri’s eyes squeezed tight as he whined, slowly coming out of the deep sleep that he had been in where horrible dreams of completely botching the next competition plagued his mind. He felt a hand splay across his bare lower stomach and felt a body shift behind him. He pressed his back against the warm, comforting skin of Victor’s chest before he felt kisses being placed across his shoulders and the back of his neck. He hummed quietly at the feeling, all of the doubts from his dreams ebbed away as Victor’s hand slowly rubbed gentle circles on his stomach, his pinky brushing down along the waistband of his briefs almost teasingly. Yuuri could feel a tingle move up his spine as Victor’s leg moved between his own, tangling the limbs together as he slowly turned his head to capture his husband’s lips in a slow, lazy kiss.

“Morning, my love.” Victor mumbled against Yuuri’s lips softly before kissing him once more. Yuuri shifted around to face him properly, kissing him again as his hands moved up to cup Victor’s face.

“Mmph, morning.” He finally said, breaking off the kiss to nudge his nose against the other. “What time is it?”

“Too early.” Victor muttered, tightening his hold on the younger man. “I think we still have time to—” and as if on cue, the alarm clock on the hotel nightstand started to ring. Victor groaned and hid his face in the side of Yuuri’s neck for a moment before rolling back and hitting the clock to shut off the noise. “Never mind.”

The two stayed silent for a few more moments before finally Victor pushed himself up, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands. Yuuri was soon to follow as they both made their way to the bathroom to get showered and get ready for the long day ahead.

 

Yuuri and Victor and Yuri and Otabek had faced off the previous day with their short programs. Due to a minor mishap where Yuuri had slipped up on a jump, Yuri and Otabek had pulled through in first place with Yuuri and Victor sitting in third. A lovely Italian pair had secured second.

Yuuri’s nerves were through the roof as they walked into the arena to try and take back their spot in first, and if they pulled off a perfect performance, they could easily surpass the others.

Yuuri’s legs bounced as he sat on the bench in the change room, skates secure on his feet. His eyes were closed as he concentrated on taking deep breaths to calm his nerves. The dreams from early that morning trying to pry their way back into the forefront of his thoughts, and he did everything in his power to push them away.

He jumped slightly, startled, as Victor returned, pressing an ice-cold bottle of water against the back of his neck, causing him to forget the nerves and thoughts all together.

“Thank you.” Yuuri mumbled softly as Victor sat down next to him with one leg on either side of the bench, his arms wrapped around Yuuri’s middle, chin resting on his shoulder.

“I could go for more sleep.” Victor said, eyes drooping shut as Yuuri took a swig of water, nodding.

“My legs feel like jelly.”

Victor turned his head so his cheek rested upon Yuuri’s shoulder as he looked down at Yuuri’s thighs. He moved a hand to rub over his legs gently.

“I’ll be out there with you, as always. We’re going to do great.” Victor said quietly, slowly moving his hand over the soft material of Yuuri’s trousers. “Don’t get to hung up on yesterday.”

“Oi, get a room!” a voice sneered, startling the couple out of their daze, completely forgetting there were other people in the room. “With that inappropriate touching.”

Victor sighed and lifted his head up to twist around, finding Yurio sitting on the bench next to theirs; Otabek looking apologetic as always.

“Says the one caught cuddling in the hotel lobby last night.” Victor finally said before turning back to rest his head on Yuuri, missing Yurio’s face turning ten shades of red.

“Sh-shut up!”

“Ah, young love.” Victor sang quietly, swaying himself side-to-side, arms back around Yuuri. “I suppose _cuddling_ was the wrong word, though.”

Yuuri turned to look at the top of Victor’s head curiously. He had fallen asleep rather early upon arrival the previous night after their skate, and he knew Victor had gone to the pool with Christophe, but he hadn’t heard anything about Yurio or Otabek.

“What do you mean?” Yuuri asked as Yurio jumped up, one skate on his foot, and the other still in his hand.

“Do not—”

“There was a whole lot more making out involved. Granted, they were sitting in a corner, but Christophe and I were on an adventure after getting out of the pool…”

“Oh my god.” Yuri groaned, falling back onto the bench to hide his face in his hands. Yuuri grinned as he glanced over to the other couple. There was a light pink tint across Otabek’s cheeks as the man rubbed his boyfriends back.

“I mean, I really am happy for you, Yurio.” Victor continued, turning back to look at him, wide smile on his face. “Also, good luck today.”

Yurio shot the men a glare before hastily tying up his skates. “We don’t need luck. We’ll take you both out.”

Victor hummed and nodded at that. “We’ll see about that.”

“V-Victor!” Yuuri cried as the announcer called all the skaters to the ice for warm up.

Victor turned to Yuuri with a grin. “Am I wrong?” to which the younger skater shook his head.

 

There were three pairs out to skate before Victor and Yuuri took the ice. Once they were out in their starting positions, they let everything around them melt away. The crowd turned into a colourful blur as they skated around the rink, spinning through step sequences and jumping in sync. The performance was almost flawless, a complete opposite of what Yuuri had been dreading all night, and when they skated in to their finishing pose, they grinned, wide. The crowd cheered their names as they waved around Russian and Japanese flags, and Yuuri could feel something like pride swelling up in his chest. Victor wrapped his arm around his waist as they skated towards the kiss and cry after bowing in every direction. Once they stepped off the ice, he leaned over and pressed a kiss to the side of Yuuri’s head.

“That was brilliant, my love.” He mumbled, just loud enough for Yuuri to hear as they stepped towards the bench to wait for their score.

Yuuri couldn’t help but beam up at the older skater as he sat down, grabbing his hand as soon as the other had sat beside him.

The wait, in reality, wasn’t very long, but to the couple it felt like hours. The crowd had long died down as the Italian pair got ready to take the ice, and when the numbers lit up in front of them, Yuuri nearly fell off of the bench as Victor let go of his hand to wrap his arms tightly around him.

They were sitting in a very good position with taking a near perfect score with their performance. The crowd was deafening at the news of their score, so loud that the noise became static.

 

After an unfortunate program from the Italian team, Yuri and Otabek took the ice with new determination on their face. They had the score to beat, but the task of beating it was another story all together

“We should change the triple axel at the end to a quad toe.” Yuri muttered as they skated onto the ice. “ _Something_ to one up them.”

Otabek shook his head when they skated into position, standing face to face with the other. “We should keep it the same, the way we’ve been practicing. Even if we are in second, we’ll still make it to the final.”

“But—”

“Please, keep it the same.”

Yuri frown but let it slip off his face as the song started. He managed to give a quick nod before skating off into the routine with Otabek at his side, immediately falling into step with one another. They spun in time with each other, and managed to pull off a flawless triple twist at the cost of Otabek’s heart health. He was still terrified of throwing his boyfriend into the air over the hard ice, but he had managed to catch him every time.

Thankfully.

So far.

They continued with step sequences and jumps, Yuri throwing Otabek into a quad salchow before Otabek immediately throwing Yuri into one of his own, hands over his head just to try and pick up those extra points. The song played on, as did their routine as they grasped onto one another, spinning at center ice, twisting their limbs around one another as they did so.

At the end of the performance, where Yuri managed to keep his word on the triple axel, the two stood in their finishing poses, breathless. They bowed to the crowd before skating off to the kiss and cry, fingers laced together once they stepped off of the ice.

Much like it had with Yuuri and Victor, it felt like years before their score lit up on the screen. At the sight of second place, Otabek could hear Yuri swear under his breath. The older man leaned over and pressed a chaste kiss to Yuri’s cheek. “It’s okay, don’t beat yourself up over it. You did amazing.” He said quiet enough for only the other to hear. Yuri nodded slowly, keeping his eyes on the ground as he frowned. He turned his face once he felt Otabek’s fingertips on his other cheek.

“I am just tired of being second to them. Both of them.” He admitted quietly, glad that no one else seemed to want to interrupt them.

Otabek nodded. “Well, you’re number one to me.”

Despite the pink tinting his cheeks, Yuri couldn’t help but snort. “That’s fucking corny.” There was a brief pause as he schooled his face back to normal before letting his forehead fall to rest on Otabek’s shoulder. “But thank you.”

Otabek smirked once Yuri’s eyes were off of his face. “No need to thank me. But we should go take a rest before our short programs tonight, yeah?”

Yuri nodded, feeling the need for a nap. The afternoon was still young and their single performances were later that evening.

 

“ _Yuuri! Congratulations!_ ”

Yuuri had almost regretted answering his phone once he had made it back to the hotel. The news of their gold had traveled quickly and he had found himself in a Skype chat with Phichit, Guang Hong and Leo once more.

He grinned at his friend’s friendly faces. “Who will I be seeing in a couple weeks?”

“ _I’m just barely hanging on._ ” Guang Hong said before letting his face sink into the pillow of his hotel bed. “It depends on the scores after this weekend. I’ll either be the sixth man or I’ll be the runner up in case of a drop out.”

“ _I’ll be there!_ ” Phichit piped in, grin on his face.

“Leo?” Yuuri asked, focusing in on Leo’s screen. It was dark, again, and he had seemingly fallen asleep. Again.

“ _I don’t think he did very well._ ” Guang Hong whispered. “ _He didn’t start off very well, and I think that got to him._ ”

Yuuri sighed, slouching somewhat at the news.

“ _Hey, Yuuri, at the banquet this year, can we—_ “ Phichit had started before Yuuri cut him off.

“No!”

“ _I didn’t even finish what I was going to say!_ ”

Yuuri grinned. “I’ve known you long enough, Phichit, and I knew that the words, ‘champagne’, ‘strip’, and ‘dance-off’ were going to come out of your mouth.”

“Did somebody say dance-off?” a voice behind Yuuri asked, startling the man, nearly causing him to drop his phone on his lap.

“V-Victor, no. No one said dance off.”

“ _Actually you just said dance-off twice._ ” Guang Hong pointed out causing Yuuri to wince.

“I said no such thing.”

“ _You totally did, man.”_ Phichit added, laughing.

“Absolutely not.”

“ _You said dance-off, Yuuri. And champagne. And strip._ ” Another voice piped up. It was a muffled, tired voice.

“Good morning, Leo.” Yuuri greeted instead of anything else, feeling his face heat up red as Victor watched him from the foot of the bed with curiosity.

“ _You need to stop calling me so early in the morning._ ”

“ _I’m_ sorry _, I just get excited, okay?_ ” Phichit cried, bowing at his laptop with his hands in front of him. “ _I won’t do it again._ ”

Leo sighed and shook his head, only visible by the light shining from his phone reflecting off of his white sheets. “ _Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Phichit. You’ll call me at any time of day no matter what. I know that, you know that._ ”

Yuuri watched as Victor walked back to the bathroom, toweling off his hair and listened to his friends arguing. Victor came back a moment later, arms stretching above his head to show off all of the muscles under his pale skin and Yuuri had to pry his eyes away when he heard his voice coming from his phone.

“ _Yuuri, you’re making a face._ ” Phichit said, squinting into his webcam as if trying to peer into Yuuri’s soul.

“A f-face?” Yuuri asked, knowing his cheeks had warmed at the sight of Victor leaving the hotel bathroom.

“ _Yeah, Yuuri. It was kind of, uh_ …” Guang Hong started, frowning as he tried to find the words.

“ _Yeah, you made those faces sometimes in Detroit when you looked at magazines with Vic—_ ”

“PHICHIT, oh my _god._ ” Yuuri cried, feeling his face heat up ten times more. Victor jumped up onto the bed at that and slid in close, and Yuuri wished that he had kept his ear buds in for the call instead of having them on speaker.

“What was Yuuri doing in Detroit? Magazines?” Victor asked, feigning innocence as he looked at the phone screen.

Phichit only grinned on his end of the call before he shook his head. “ _Never mind! I’m going to go make some food. Have a good night, guys!_ ”

Almost immediately his video feed went black, leaving Guang Hong and Leo, who had seemingly fallen asleep once more.

“ _I wasn’t in Detroit so I can’t exactly help, but uh, I don’t think I want to. And, uh, Yuuri’s face makes sense now. Hi, Victor. Um, I need to go get a drink, so I’ll leave you two be. Congratulations again!_ ”

Yuuri watched in horror as another friend left the call, leaving only Leo. Knowing the man wasn’t going to magically wake back up again to help the situation, he too ended the call and turned to Victor, who seemed to be waiting for an answer he very well already knew.

“Magazines?” he asked again, eyebrows raised.

“Sh-shut up!” Yuuri groaned, pushing Victor away from him, but the older man only leaned against him more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one chapter to go


	10. final

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [yuuri and victor's exhibition song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDprYZ-tgiA)   
>  [yuri and otabek's exhibition song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXq5VvYAI1Q)

Yuuri couldn’t hear for the cheering in the arena, and his sight was blocked as Victor’s arms wrapped around him in the tightest hug he had ever received in the history of the universe. His lungs couldn’t take in enough air as he breathed heavily, feeling sweat trickle down his back underneath his shirt. Victor pulled back finally, wide grin on his face and tears in his eyes as he stepped back to bow to the audience around the rink, and Yuuri followed suit because he knew he had to, but his brain otherwise felt like it was short circuiting. The flashing lights around the rink weren’t helping, and every time he blinked he saw stars.

The entire free skate program passed in a blur, in fact, he barely remembered stepping onto the ice for the warm up.

The pair skated to the kiss and cry to wait for their score. By the crowd and Victor’s reaction though, Yuuri assumed they had done okay.

They had been the last of the skaters to skate that evening and Yuuri was feeling the nerves well up throughout the day, to the point he had blocked out everything around him, mostly to keep himself from breaking down mere minutes before stepping onto the ice. The looks on the other skater’s faces in the crowd rink-side made him grow more anxious as they stepped towards the bench in the kiss and cry.

Yuri was glaring at the two, and if looks could kill…

Yuuri gulped.

Yuuri was glad he couldn’t hear whatever the younger skater was muttering to his boyfriend in the stands, but Otabek seemed to be clapping anyway, and offered a smile towards the pair when they had locked eyes.

He had barely a second to take in his surroundings properly once he had sat down before Victor’s arms were flying around his shoulders again, and he nearly fell off of the bench and onto the floor at the force of the other man’s body against his. The crowd was cheering, flags were flying, and he was having minor flash backs from the year before when he had finished his free skate. His face was heating up as he realized all eyes were on them, and Victor was mumbling against his neck, words he couldn’t decipher.

Everything following was quite similar to every other competition. There were interviews, and the medal ceremony that took place before the junior single’s free skate the very same evening.

The gold medal hung heavy around Yuuri’s neck, but he smiled for the camera because that was what was expected of him. His brain still hadn’t caught up to what was happening, and he felt foggy, like he was in some sort of weird dream that he was waiting to wake up from. From the beginning of the new pairs project, it had felt like an uphill battle, a slow going uphill battle. Standing on the top of the podium with his free hand holding Victor’s, he realized how quickly the last year had gone and all of the practice they had put in between his singles practice had paid off. He had always found it hard to be proud of himself, but standing up on that podium with his husband right at his side made that change. He wasn’t just proud of himself, he was proud of both of them.

Yuri and Otabek had landed in third, much to the surprise of literally everyone in the arena. An American pair had slipped past them both after their performance, and no one had seen it coming.

“It’s okay, Yura. Don’t beat yourself up, you will get that gold during the singles.” Otabek murmured as they stood on the podium, waiting to accept their bronze medal.

“I flubbed on the quad salchow, Beka. What if I do that again tomorrow? And why aren’t you aiming for gold, ha?” Yuri whispered, fury settling in his voice though he remained quiet as the ceremony continued, not waiting to disrupt it, nor did he want to aim his anger at his boyfriend. He wasn’t mad at him at all, he mostly was angry with himself.

Otabek sighed quietly and lowered his head for the medal to be placed around his neck. His hand tightened around Yuri’s as he smiled for the cameras before leaning over. “Oh, I’m aiming for the gold, but you will win it. That is how it will go.”

Yuri sighed and shook his head but said nothing more as the photos continued.

 

Yuri did in fact win gold that weekend, and Otabek had definitely been aiming for gold as he slid into second close behind his boyfriend. The two shared the podium with Phichit, who was once again thrilled by his bronze medal, and Yuuri couldn’t help but cheer rink-side for his best friend.

 

The exhibition on the final day was relaxing, with not having to be judged. Yuuri and Victor had choreographed a routine when they had first started their pairs skating during the previous year, though had decided against competing with it as it had been missing components that they couldn’t easily add in. Thankfully, the gala didn’t have strict requirements, and they were able to skate freely and had decided to perform the routine. They hadn’t been practicing it much in the last few months, so their performance was a bit messy, but they didn’t mind, they weren’t being judged for it. The music took them away to a world where only they existed, skating under a bright spotlight in their nicest and most comfortable skating outfits. Their lifts were a bit more complex than they had been when they first choreographed the routine, but the rest was simple with a quad here and a spin there. They filled the majority of the song with complicated step sequences to show off their edges and lifts that showed off Victor’s ever growing strength with Yuuri over his head.

Yuri and Otabek were quite the opposite in their performance. They had been practicing their short programs and free skate programs so intensely that they hadn’t even considered choreographing an exhibition performance. Just by the looks on both of their faces when they arrived on the final day, it was clear they had spent the majority of the night throwing one together, just by the dark circles under their eyes.

“We are already skating for singles, do we really need to skate for pairs as well?” Yuri had mumbled while waiting rink-side for their turn on the ice.

Otabek rubbed the other’s back and laughed. “That would be far too easy. We aren’t being marked on this, we could fill it with waltz jumps and bunny hops if we wanted to.”

“At least we managed to track down a song, that’s always the hard part.”

Otabek nodded in agreement as they stepped closer to the door to the ice.

“So, about those waltz jumps and bunny hops?” he asked, fingers brushing against Yuri’s until their fingers laced together.

The younger skater hummed and let his head rest against the other’s shoulder. “No crazy jumps, we can save those for our own. Maybe a triple twist if anything crazy. Lots of footwork and lifts, though. We’ll stay side by side and we can figure it out more as we go, but I think what we came up with last night on paper was good.”

“We are so unprepared.” Otabek mumbled. “Have you ever had to wing it for one of these?”

Yuri shook his head. “Yakov always made sure I was prepared. I think having to remember six separate routines would actually be too much to keep track of. Remember my exhibition last year? This year is gonna look awfully similar.”

“You’re probably right.”

The pair took the ice a short while later after Phichit had stepped off of the ice, beaming up at the crowd as he waved his arms around before he left to join Yuuri and Victor.

Despite their few hours of planning, Yuri and Otabek’s performance went off without a hitch, and they didn’t have to include waltz jumps or bunny hops in any way. The crowd continued to cheer them on as they stepped off the ice, only to get back in line to get back on the ice for their solo performances.

 

Yuuri leaned forward and pressed his forehead to the cool glass in front of him, his eyes scanning the downtown Vancouver skyline. He sighed softly before turning around, finding Victor leaning against the end of the bed, tying up his tie.

“Do we really have to go to the banquet?” Yuuri asked, already knowing the answer. He turned back to the window. “It’s so nice here, I just want to go explore.”

Victor chuckled softly as he tucked his tie into his jacket before pushing away from the bed.

“We don’t leave for a couple more days, we have all the time in the world to look around before that.” Victor said, walking towards Yuuri to wrap his arms around his waist. The two stayed quiet as they looked at the window, high up in the hotel and overlooking the city. Victor leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to Yuuri’s neck, and Yuuri shivered in response. “We should head downstairs now, though. We’re already going to be arriving fashionably late.”

“And whose fault is that?” Yuuri asked in a playful tone, twisting his head back to grin at his husband.

“Yours. You know I can’t say no.”

 

The couple headed down to the mezzanine level of the hotel where the banquet was being held. As soon as the elevator door opened, they were already being met with cameras flashing and reporters asking all the questions they’d already answered one hundred times over. They swerved through the crowd and into the banquet hall, keeping their mouths shut until they were safe.

“I haven’t had nearly enough to drink to deal with them yet.” Victor muttered as he led them both towards the bar. “How many flutes of champagne would you like tonight?”

“Shut up.”

Victor laughed softly and ordered two glasses of wine for the both of them instead. “My love, you will never live it down.”

Yuuri sighed and leaned his head on Victor’s shoulder as he waited for the drinks to arrive. “I mean, it’s embarrassing, but you came to Japan in the end and I couldn’t be happier.”

“Yuuri!!”

Yuuri nearly jumped out of his skin at the voice behind him, but grinned when he turned around to see Phichit, dressed to the nines with a glass in his hand.

“I wanted to congratulate you both again on your gold!” he said, beaming up at Yuuri and Victor, once the latter had turned around with the wine. “I wouldn’t have expected anything less from you guys, but you were both so good! Especially after the everything you guys had to do.”

Yuuri bowed towards Phichit before taking his drink from Victor. “Thank you, Phichit. But same for you with your bronze. How are you feeling?”

Phichit gave a bit of a shrug as he took a sip of his cocktail. “You know, after everything that happened last year after the final, I’m feeling really good. I have a really good feeling about Worlds this year.” He paused for a moment before a smirk tugged at his lips. “And I hope to see both of you there!”

Victor cut in at that, his own smirk nearly mirroring that of the Thai skater. “You will most definitely see us there.”

 

The night continued as such, and Yuuri and Victor continued mingling amongst their friends and fellow skaters. They managed to avoid the reporters for most of the night, and Yuuri had succeeded in _not_ starting another dance battle, as much as Christohpe reminded Yuuri and Victor both that he had, in fact, brought his pole ‘just in case’. Yuuri had only rolled his eyes and walked away towards Phichit to leave his husband with his friend.

The later it became, the more people started to trickle out of the banquet hall and back to their hotel rooms. Victor had rejoined Yuuri after Christophe had left with his boyfriend, wrapping his arm loose around his waist and resting his chin on his shoulder, while Yuuri discussed various step sequence techniques with Otabek, who seemed to be hiding Yuri from anyone and everyone that evening.

“We should get out of here.” Victor muttered into Yuuri’s ear, causing the hair on the back of his neck to stand. “And celebrate.” He added after a moment, voice dropping about ten octaves.

Yuuri cleared his throat as he felt his cheeks warm, more than they already had with the few glasses of wine he had consumed that night. Yuuri nodded and bid goodnight to Otabek, and Yuri for what it was worth, before letting Victor lead him out of the room.

As soon as they had left the hall, they were being bombarded with the few reporters that had had the energy to stick around. Yuuri and Victor looked at each other and sighed, knowing they wouldn’t be able to get out of it now.

The questions were the same as they’d already answered, and the pair took turns until one reporter asked, “what are your plans for next season? Will you compete again next year?”

Yuuri looked up at Victor before looking to the reporter that had asked and he smiled. “I think we’ll definitely be back next year. We’ve only just begun, after all.”

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! kudos and comments are the bees knees!
> 
> you can yell at me about yoi and victuuri on my [tumblr](http://plisstsky.tumblr.com)!


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